


Rise of the Sugar Rush Racers

by SiaCatGirl



Category: Brave (2012), How to Train Your Dragon (2010), Rise of the Guardians (2012), Tangled (2010), The Lorax (2012), Wreck-It Ralph (2012)
Genre: Adventure, Crossover, Crossover Pairings, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Humor, Romance, So many tags, so many different characters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-03
Updated: 2013-06-13
Packaged: 2017-12-07 08:53:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 19,642
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/746644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SiaCatGirl/pseuds/SiaCatGirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The king of Sugar Rush, Once-Lick, was attacked by Pitch Virus and transformed into his dark alter-ego, Greed-Pop. He forces the racers to race constantly, so he can collect more and more coins. And the only ones who can save the game are 4 unlockable characters: Minty C. Hiccup, Jack Frosting, Rapangel Cake and MeriDough "Sticky" BunBroch. Inspired by spock-sickle from DeviantArt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so this is the prologue to my fanfic "Rise of the Sugar Rush Racers" and it's a giant crossover between HTTYD, Tangled, Brave, ROTG, Lorax and WIR. Oh my. Read and leave your opinion. =)

Another busy day for Sugar Rush racers. King Once-Lick and his little sister Vanellope von Schweetz watched from the balcony of their castle other citizens and racers going back to their homes after an everyday race to choose who the kids will be able to play as tomorrow. Young princess of this candy world didn't feel like racing today, so she just stood there with her older brother, looking at the crowd cheering Candlehead and Minty Zaki.

"Okay, I'll go to sleep now. Good night, Oncie." - she said with a big yawn and went to her bedroom.

"Good night, sis." - he replied. After a few minutes Once-Lick went to his study - Peanorax must've left him more paperwork to finish.

As soon as he sat at his desk he felt dizzy, everything seemed glitchy.

"I don't feel well..." - the king murmured to himself. - "Like something's in my code..."

An evil laugh echoed in his head, and then he knew no more.

Once-Lick was not Once-Lick any longer, even though it didn't seem like that. His appearance remained similar, but... different. Darker. Full of greed and desire for gold.

He went back to the balcony and looked around himself. An evil grin crossed his face.

"Well, Sugar Rush citizens... Meet your new king."


	2. You Unlocked New Racers!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 1, where two kids unlock 4 new Sugar Rush racers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YAY!!! I wrote the 1st chapter at least... Hope to keep working. Sorry if some words repeat too often: english isn't my first language, so I can't alaways find an apropriate synonym.  
> P.S. Gummybear Pascal is my idea! ^^

How long have they been here? For a year? A month? A day? A moment?

A girl with blonde hair reaching her feet and light green eyes looked around. Nothing more than plain grey walls and her trustfull little friend - a gummybear chameleon named Pascal, who could easily change flavours whenever he wanted to. Right now, he was in his usual one - green apple. Blondie sighed sadly. She's been here for who knows how long! And it seemed like they were destined to be locked here forever... To drive herself out of the downing thoughts, she started singing - that's her favourite hobby:

_'Cause, baby, you're a fi-i-i-irework!_  
Come on, show 'em wha-a-a-at you're worth!  
Make 'em go "Ah! Ah! Ah!"  
As you shoot across the sky-y-y!" 

Still, that didn't help much. The girl sat in the corner and closed her eyes. This cube was starting to be more like a prison. It's easy to lose a sense of time here. And the only thing she could hope for is that one day she'll get out of here.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Hey, it's my turn to play now!"

"No, it's not!"

Two kids, brother and sister, were fighting about whose time it is to play Sugar Rush. They've already used 8 racers and brought them all to the finish line first. Now it was the last racer, Crumbelina DiCaramello, "greatest girl racer of all times" in girl's opinion. Not wanting to lose her chance to her brother, she went for her most effective tecnique - tearfull puppy-dog eyes. As always, it worked, and she pridefully sat onto the chair and put a coin into the slot. With a familiar music, the screen showed 9 racers, sweet as candy. Without hesitation, the girl pressed the button on Crumbelina. And now her tiramisu-styled kart was on the track. The race has started.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A boy with short brown hair and dark, olive-green eyes was sitting under the wing of his licorice dragon Toothlice. Don't let the fact that he's a reptile trick you - his IQ is equivalent to human's. Plus, he's an incredible flyer and can shoot bursts of molten sugar - you'd better watch out, because it's freakingly hot! But despite all these facts, Toothlice is a very kind and nice animal. The boy scratched his friend behind the ear and stared at the ceiling - same grey, as always. Nothing to do, no way out, and they couldn't do anything about it. Though there was a little hope... That one day, when all 9 racers cross the finish line in one day, they'll be free. Unfortunately, it was very unlikely to happen.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Just a little more... Only a few meters left...

"YES!"

She did it! Crumbelina finished first! The trophy and bonus coins added more score to her profile. She was now the third racer from the top!

Brother and sister wanted to leave and tell everyone they played all 9 racers in one day, when a big and bright message appeared on the screen along with a fanfare music.

**_"You unlocked new racers!"_ **

Kids were amazed. They didn't expect it to happen! On the screen were pictures of four new racers.

The first one was a boy with brown hair, dark green eyes and freckles all over his round nose and cheeks, wearing an ice cream-styled cap, green shirt, waffle-styled vest, brown pants, decorated with an ice cream at the end, chocolate boot on his right leg and a waffle cone for his left foot. He was the Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream racer named Minty C. Hiccup.

The second was a boy too. He had hair as white as sugar pouder, in which was a round white and red candy, blue eyes and slightly noticable freckles on his cheeks. On him was a long-sleeved warm-looking cocoa shirt, decorated with white lines of cream along the sleeves and whipped cream on the collar and a candy at the bottom , similar to the one in his hair, dark-chocolate pants and white and red-striped boots. In his hand he was holding a candy-cane crook. This was the Peppermint Hot Chocolate racer Jack Frosting.

The third racer was a timid-looking girl with blonde hair reaching her feet, light green eyes and a few freckles on her nose. She had a cherry-styled hairpin, a purple and pink dress with sprinkel all over it which looked like a cupcake, a whipped cream bracelet on her right arm, violet leggings and white shoes with sprinkles as well. Her name was Rapangel Cake, and she was an Angel Food Cupcake racer.

Last, but not least, was a red-headed girl with her curles in a ponytail, two small braids falling freely on both sides of her face, light blue eyes and freckles on her cheeks. Her outfit was a cinnamon roll hairpin, chocolate and honey dress and dark-brown shoes. In her hand was a honey-bun bow, and on her back, in a caramel container, were were arrows with bread arrowheads. The Cinnamon Roll/Honey-Bun racer's name was MeriDough BunBroch.

Little did the four of them know that their fate will bring them to the most fascinating adventure in their lives.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song Rapangel sings is "Firework" by Katy Perry from Madagaskar 3.  
> HTTYD and ROTG belongs to Dreamworks  
> Tangled and WIR belong to Disney  
> Brave belongs to Disney/Pixar


	3. Getting It Across!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 2, in which our heroes meet each other in the world of Sugar Rush.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, it actually turned out to be longer that I expected.........
> 
> Anyway, since all characters from Sugar Rush are about 10 years old, I decided to try to give our main 4 a bit of childish behavior, and a little humor. Hope I did well! And sorry for Mer's not very good accent: I have NO IDEA how to write one! ^^;

The first thing Jack - and, actually, others as well - noticed were fading walls. They were dissipating into nowhere. And then... popped like a bubble. Gone. In place of plain grey cube was a beautiful endless lanscape of pinkish-red valley with a few lollipop trees, breakjaws, sugar-covered marmalades and minty pathways. That's it! He's finally free! Jack started jumping around in amazement, twisting and turning his candy-cane crook in process. After about a minute of euphoria he simply fell to the ground on the hill and stared into the crystal-clear blue sky. Freedom! Finally, after what seemed like forever! Getting back on his feet, he accidently let go of his "staff", and it slided down to the purple taffy swamp. Jack immediatly jolted after it, almost tripping over his own feet and sliding down the hill as he did so. Finally, he picked it up at the swamp's bank. But as he turned around, MeriDough bumped into him while running somewhere.

"Oh! Watch out!" - Jack said, rubbing his head. Just then his glance fell onto her curly red hair, taken up in a ponytail. - "Hey, your hair's on fire! No wonder you're in a hurry."

"Meh hair's... on fire?!" - Mer sounded startled, if not frightened.

"Just kidding. Red hair really go with some people." - the white-haired boy laughed kindly and extended his hand. - "I'm Jack Frosting."

"MeriDough BunBroch." - she replied and they shook each other's hands. - "Speakin' o' hair, yer's like it was washed with flour."

"Program feature. And what's with your accent? It sounds... Scottish or something."

"Yeah. Program feature es well."

"Oh, okay. Hey, do you know where I am?"

"Bel'eve it er not, I'd like to kno' it too."

"Well, let's look around then, maybe someone knows. C'mon, fizzy hair!"

"I'm NOT fizzy hair, yeh ghost-like prankster!"

After about an hour of walking around, they came to the same spot. Again. Forth time in a row. But there was a little difference this time. And that difference was Rapangel, sitting on a jawbreaker and crying. They felt instant pity for her, so they came closer to comfort her.

"Oi, why are yeh cryin', lassie?" - Mer asked her.

"I... I don't know what to do. I'm lost and have no idea of what this place is." - blondie raised her head, tears still falling down her cheeks. - "You too?"

"Um, well, sorta." - little prankster answered, looking at the girl. There was something... something unusual about her, something charming, and it's not because of her weirdly long hair. That were eyes... Wide open, green like a fresh apple, a bit naive, but full of wonder.

"So, how did yeh wind up here, um... What's yer name?"

"Rapangel. Rapangel Cake."

"I'm MeriDough BunBroch, an' that candy-cane-crooked lad is Jack Frosting." - the red-head nodded at Jack. - "Okay, so how did yeh wind up here, Rapangel?"

"And what's that... l-lizard doing on your shoulder?" - the boy couldn't help but notice a little orange-flavoured chameleon looking out of her hair, scared and curious at the same time.

"He's not a lizard, Jack." - Punzie replied in a rather strict tone of voice. Apparantly, she didn't like when her friend was taken as a mere reptile. - "This is my gummybear chameleon, Pascal. Pascal, these are MeriDough and Jack."

"Aw, he looks cute." - Mer said, smiling, as she petted the strange-looking animal. Pascal slowly became apple-flavoured, as for usual. - "Wee cutie. A'right, that's the third time I ask this cursed question: how did yeh wind up here, lassie?"

"Um, I was in a big grey cube, as have always been, but all of a sudden it started fading away and then - plop! - popped like a baloon. That's how I appeared here. Anyway, I've been walking around here for about an hour, but it was fruitless. So I just stayed here."

Kids shared expressive glances of surprise. It just couldn't be... Could it?

"Big grey cube? Sounds just like the one I've always been in too!"

"An' meh too!"

Jack turned to MeriDough, astonished. "Really?"

She nodded.

They've all been in a strange thing with no exit for, like, their whole life! But how didn't they ever meet each other before? How...

Mer's train of thought was broken when a sound of falling tree branches came from the nearby forest of peppermint trees. Everyone turned their heads to the direction of it. What the heck could that be? Judging by the fact that peppermint trees are, simply saying, very hard to break, it must be something huge. Or strong. No, both huge and strong. Bravely, MeriDough started going towards the source of the sound, waving to others to follow her. Jack calmly came along, Punzie nervously walked behind him. It didn't take long to find a few broken candy-cane and lollipop trees. This scenery was quite impressive, for they stood back to back, looking around frightenedly. Then a quick sound of broken caramel was heard. Guys gasped in surprise and horror: for them it seemed that sound lasted forever! MeriDough took a bow out of her container and pulled her bow ready, Jack prepared to use his "staff" in a ninja-manner of fight, and Rapangel took out a frying pan (man, where did she get that?).

"O-okay, whoever you are, c-come out slowly..." - Punzie started, extremely nervous and scared, but still trying to stand her ground and sound fearless. - "I have this heavy fry... um... Weapon. And... A-and I'm not afraid to use it!"

Then she lowered down to Mer and whispered into her ear: "You think that scared him?"

"Oi, definetly, I kno' I'm scared." - she replied, trying to make it as unnoticably sarcastic as possible.

Another sound. Footsteps this time. Everyone gripped their weapons tightly, ready to bring down that creature. But, to their surprise, out of the forest came a brown-haired boy in a mint-chocolate cape and a waffle cone prosthetic. Sure, his slender figure didn't give him an appearence of a professional wrecker. Girls sighed in relief and chuckled a little. How could they take such a small boy for a monster?

"Sorry, we thought you were a wrecker or something." - Rapangel said shyly, lowering her eyes.

"Me? A wrecker? Come on, look at me." - the boy gestured to himself. - "How can all of me break so much?"

Guys shared glances and nodded to each other.

"Yeah, doesn' raelly look like tha'. Sorry once again."

"Nah, it's alright with me. I'm Minty C. Hiccup, by the way." - he smiled and extended his hand.

"Mah name's MeriDough BunBroch." - the red-head shook his hand. - "That wee blonde lassie is Rapangel Cake, a c'meleon on her shoulder's Pascal, and that white-haired lad is Jack Frosting."

"Nice to meet all of you guys."

"So, what brings you here, Hic?" - Jack didn't hesitate to ask.

"I'm looking for Toothlice. He's very easy to spot: jet-black, big green eyes, red stripes on his ears, long tail - in one word, he's a good little..."

The brown-head didn't finish, as from behind came a dark figure with cat-like stunning green eyes. Everyonr turned around to see an animal about two times bigger than any of them, with big black wings and long tail. It couldn't be anyone else but a...

"DRAGON!" - Punzie screamed into the air. Surprisingly, the creature started roaring in fear as well. MeriDough's reaction was just as quick as her arrows, one of which she immediately shot at the beast, who almost at the same time shot a blast at her. Both dodged each other's attackes in time. The dragon's shot left a serious hole in the ground. Mer was about to loose another arrow, when Hiccup jumped right between her and the animal.

"Hiccup, wha' are yeh...?"

"Toothlice, calm down! Calm down, bud! They're friends!" - the boy was extendidng his arms in a calming way, trying to low the dragon's rage down a little. Somehow, it worked, and he obediently sat on his hind legs. Then he turned to his friends. - "It's okay, you just scared him."

" _I_ scared _him_?!" - the red-head said, shocked. She scared him? Wait a second... - "Who is _him_?"

"Ugh, guys, this is Toothlice, my licorice dragon. Toothlice, these are Jack, Rapangel and MeriDough."

Girls awkwardly looked at the reptile, who was still drilling holes in them with his eyes.

"Oh, don't worry, he's actually a very nice dragon. You respect him - he'll respect you. Simple."

Rapangel was getting shivers on her back at the glance of such a magnificent creature, but really soon curiosity took over, and she slowly walked towards Toothlice, carefully extending her hand out.

"Don't be afraid, relax." - Hiccup encouraged her. - "It's okay, it's okay."

Slowly, but surely now, blondie placed her small arm onto dragon's nose. To her ultimate surprise, Toothlice closed his eyes and purred. He really wasn't that scary after all!

"Aww, he's so cuuuuute!" - Punzie couldn't help but give this winged sweetheart a hug. Like any other normal girl, she loves everything cute, just how it's supposed to be.

Meanwhile, Jack checked the hole burned by this very same dragon. It wasn't very deep, but still the ground around it was charred, and something sticky was almost all over it. Whatever it was, it had a very pleasant caramel smell. Carefully, Jack touched this mysterious substance and then immediately drew his hand aside, for he almost burnt his fingers because of this.

"Ouch! Hot!"

"Of course it's hot, it's _molten sugar_! - Hic said in a manner-of-fact tone.

Everyone turned their heads to the hole. A quiet "Wow!" escaped their lips.

"Well, what do we do now?" - MeriDough finally asked.

"Hey, guys, I just remembered - I saw a racing track not very far from here! Maybe we'll find someone there, and he, or she, will explain us where we are and what's going on in here."

"That's wonderful! C'mon, show us the way!" - Jack sounded rather excited.

"No way! I'm not goin' anywhere, meh feet are achin' like I danced on nails or somethin'! - Mer protested right on spot. Rapangel nodded in agreement - just a thought of going somewhere on foot for at least another minute was sweeping her off her feet.

"Well, I can give you a ride on Toothlice, if you want." - the brown-head gestured to his reptile friend. Girls were now shining from joy - who's gonna refuse to ride a real dragon, mate? MeriDough climed up him first, Rapangel was next. When everyone was feeling comfortable on Toothlice, our gang of rookie racers went to the direction Hic was showing, Pascal lying lazily between dragon's striped ears.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit about chapters ahead: in the next one we'll meet Peanorax in person, and in later ones we'll meet Fix-It Felix and Wreck-It Ralph! No Sgt. Calhoun, sorry, only minor cameo appearences.
> 
>  
> 
> HTTYD and ROTG belong to Dreamworks  
> Tangled and WIR belong to Disney  
> Brave belongs to Disney/Pixar


	4. Bake Your Own Kart!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 3, in which our main heroes meet Peanorax and get their own karts.

"So, you say that all four of us are, like, secret unlockable characters of this game?"

Jack, MeriDough, Hiccup and Rapangel were now walking up along the road in hope to find a town or at least something like that. Big cotton candy clouds lazily floated in the sky. The whole air was filled with a very slight smell of coke.

"I think so, Jack." - Hic told his new-found friend. - "Otherwise, why would someone keep us locked up like that?"

"Hmm, now it makes a' least some sense t' meh." - Mer said, walking beside Toothlice: only Punzie remained sitting on him. - "But then, how did we get, ye kno', unlocked?"

"Umm... I don't know. However..."

"However what?"

"However it may have something to do with the possibility that all nine racers get the winner's cup in one day. I never believed in it... until now, that is."

His friends "Oh!"ed in unison. 

They've passed yet another mile, and still there was no sign of civilized life. And as if on purpose it was getting hot like in the oven. Moving around was becoming harder and harder. Nothing but clouds, pink and chocolate ground, tiny pebble-like nuts covered in white cream and a faint sound of engine in the distance. There was no way our heroes were gonna... Wait, what? Engine? Toothlice's ears immediately perked up, carefully listening into it. Quite soon kids heard it too. The sound was gradually getting louder and louder. Their joy was overwhelming, because an engine sound means a working kart, and a working kart means someone's driving it! Maybe they'll show them where the town is! Jack immediately jolted forward, with Toothlice following him nose to nose and MeriDough and Hiccup trying to keep up with them. Fortunately, it didn't last long, for they easily spotted a peanut-like kart moving towards them. Kids tried to draw its driver's attention to themselves as well as they could: Rapangel, along with Pascal, Jack, Mer and Hic, shouted louder than the little blue boy blowing his horn (A/N: did I write it correctly? cuz I'm not exactly familiar with english fairytales) while standing atop the licorice dragon, who was also roaring in his highest vocals, though not really understanding why. Alas, the kart rushed past them like a wind, as fast as it appeared. Dissapointement was written all over kids' faces. With a heavy sigh, they wanted to keep walking up along the road, when they heard something like a clap, similar to the ones when old cars suddenly slow down. Then, to their ultimate surprise, it slowly moved backwards in their direction. As soon as it aligned with Jack and Hiccup, it stopped.

The kart itself was simple, yet quite unusual. It was a big Circus Peanut-styled car with wheels made of almond cookies and a fluffy mustache on the front. It's owner was a peanut as well, with a no less fluffy mustache  equivalent eyebrows, formal green vest and a tiny red candy-wrapper bow-tie.

"Weren't you taught to not shout so loudly at the road? I could've crashed, you know!"

"I'm sorry, we only wanted to..." - Jack started while trying to figure an excuse, but was roughly interrupted by the very same peanut.

"What's your name, young man?"

The boy looked at him like he's just fallen off a tree.

"Well, I could ask you the same question, mister."

"Oh my, where are my manners?" - the kart's driver clapped his forehead. - "Let me introduce myself: I'm Peanorax, the trustful lackey of the rightful ruler of Sugar Rush - king Greed-Pop."

Girls secretly shared confused and nervous glances. Sure, "Greed-Pop" didn't sound very pleasant.

"And so, I ask you again: what is your name?"

"Oh, my name is Jack Frosting. These are Minty C. Hiccup, Rapangel Cake, MeriDough BunBroch, licorice dragon Toothlice and gummy-bear chameleon Pascal."

"Glad to meet you all. Say, I haven't seen you around before. Where are you from?" - Peanorax narrowed his eyes suspiciously.

"Umm, we're... we're..." - Hiccup was desperately trying to find the proper words somehow.

"WE'RE FROM RACER TRAINING COURSES!"

Everyone turned to Rapangel with astonishment. Realizing what she's just done, she shamefully pulled her head to her shoulders.

"Yep. Newbies. First time here." - blondie said quietly, looking down at her feet.

"Ah, alright then." - it seemed like the lackey didn't even notice her unexpected scream. - "I'll just fill in some papers about you along with your karts and you will be officially  registered as citizens of Sugar Rush and playable racers."

'So that's the name of this place. Sugar Rush.' - the thought crossed all 4 minds.

Then suddenly Peanorax turned to them.

"You _do_ have karts, don't you?"

Kids at first started nodding, but then shared glances of embarrassment and  simultaneously shook their heads. See for yourself: how would you get a kart if you were unlocked only about an hour and a half ago?

"That's bad, that's really bad.... But don't worry, you get a special chance to bake your own ones!" - mustached peanut declared cheerfully as he sat back into his vehicle. - "Hop in, and I'll take ya to the Kart Factory!"

With smiles on their faces, each of our heroes got in: Jack on the front seat, Hiccup on right back one, Rapangel on the left, MeriDough between them. As soon as Punzie took her seat, Mer pulled her closer quietly shouted into her ear:

" _Wha' was tha' just now? What were yeh thinkin'? "Racer Training Courses", huh? Couldn't yeh come up with somethin' bet'r?"_

_"Well, what do you think I shoud've said?"_ \- blondie replied with insult. - _"I was nervous, plus all the tension around, and I just blurted out the first thing that came to my mind."_

__"Now, I'm sorry, but the animal," - Peanorax pointed at Toothlice, - "will have to go on its own."

"His name is _Toothlice_." - Hic quite angrily responded to it. Just like Rapangel, he didn't like his best friend to be compared to a brainless reptile.

"Alright. _Toothlice_ will have to go on its own."

The dragon only snorted and rolled his eyes.

"Don't worry, buddy, just keep up with us and everything's gonna be downright great!"

The engine was started, and the kart with a fair speed made its way along the road in the direction of the Kart Factory.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

15 minutes seemed to flow by with the speed of a cheetah. All the way to the factory kids were excitedly admiring the view around them. It's amazing how can a landscape consisting of only sweets and its various kinds be so beautiful.

Finally, they were here. As always, Beard Papa was on his security guard post, peacefully snoring. Being rather polite by nature and raised by following rules of etiquette, Peanorax knocked on the post's side to wake the security guard up. No response  He knocked again. Still sleeping. Starting to lose his patience a little, the mustached peanut simply shouted:

"WAKE UP!"

Fortunately, that was loud enough to wake Beard Papa. Startled, he looked around for quite some time until he noticed the king's lackey watching him unemotionally. 

"Oh, hello, Peanorax." - Beard Papa greeted him. - "What do you need here?"

"Hello, my friend." - Peanorax said back. - "I need to take the new racers inside so they can make their own karts."

"Heh, newbies? Well, that's good. That's always good." - the security guard lifted the barrier. - "Have fun in there, kids!"

The four nodded, smiling, and Peanorax's car slowly moved towards the factory entrance. But just as the kart passed underneath the barrier, it was lowered right in front of Toothlice's nose.

"Sorry, boy, but any animal bigger than a racing kart is not allowed to enter. Nothing personal."

The dragon groaned angrily. Not allowed to enter, huh? Well, no rule will ever stop this reptile from doing what he wants to! And, luckily for him, Beard Papa quickly fell asleep again. Using the perfect opportunity, he carefully and as quietly as he could crawled underneath the barrier and ran towards his friends. Toothlice reached them just in time, for Hiccup was about to close the door behind them.

Now, I don't want to tire you with four basically same chains of events showing how each one of them made their cars, so I'll skip that part and get to the point when MeriDough's kart, the final one, was decorated.  
  
Three freshly-baked vehicles were standing outside near the factory. Hiccup's kart was waffle cone shaped with licorice lines along it, chocolate frosting on the back and mint chocolate chip icecream wheels. Jack's one had peppermint wheels and was covered in a whole bunch of cocoa and chocolate frosting with cream decorations, the peppermint base only visible at the bottom. Rapangel's was, without a doubt, the most colorful: when it came to decorating, she let her imagination go wild, and that resulted in all colors of frosting and all types of sprinkles finding their little place on her kart and vanilla-icecream wheels.  
  
And now, finally, Mer rolled out her newly-baked car: it was a bread-styled, with swiss roll wheels and covered in a layer of honey.  
  
"A'right, lads an' lassies, meet meh beautiful work o' art!" - she said prodly as she placed her hand onto her "masterpiece". But as she took her hand away, she saw that it was covered in honey from her kart. Apparently, it hasn't dried yet.  
  
"Hah, a sticky situation, right, Mer?" - Jack teased MeriDough a little, slightly emphasising on the word "sticky". Hic and Punzie tried to hold back their chuckles.  
  
But the red-head didn't actually find it teasing. Instead, she smiled and even licked some honey from her hand. "Mmmm, sweet!"  
  
Smelling the irresistably tasty vehicle, Toothlice almost licked it too.  
  
"Hey, shoo, yeh sweet tooth!" - Mer tried to shoo him away, but instead he started licking her honey-covered hand. At that moment no one could hold their laughs and immediatly bursted into laugh, including the red-head. And, of course, the dragon had no idea what they were laughung at. He's a pretty smart animal, but can't find actions funny sometimes, including his own.  
  
"Okay, kids, now that you have your own vehicles," - Peanorax came by with his schedule in his hands, - "it's time for you to go the main track and race along with the others. I've already filled in the proper papers, so I'll take them to the king, and everything's gonna be alright."  
  
"So, ready for your first race, Sticky?" - Jack didn't lose much time giving MeriDough a nickname. Luckily, she liked it.  
  
"Ready as I'll ever be, candy-cane." - she smirked mischievously.  
  
Our heroes didn't have much trouble figuring out how to drive, for it was already put into their code. While going along the road, they came across one of the racing characters of the game. She was cleaning her cherry-pie kart.  
  
"Oh, hello, Jubileena, nice to see you!" - Peanorax greeted her warmly.  
  
"Hi, Peanorax!" - she cheerfully greeted him, waving her hand. In just a second she noticed Jack, Rapangel and everyone else. - "Who are these people?"  
  
"Jubileena, these are the new game racers - Minty C. Hiccup, Jack Frosting, Rapangel Cake and Meridough BunBroch, and their animal friends - Pascal and Toothlice. Hiccup, Jack, Rapangle, MeriDough, meet Jubileena Bing-Bing, one of the professional Sugar Rush racers." - he then turned to the cherry girl. - "Can you, please, show them around? I have some important business to do."  
  
"Of course, sir!"  
  
"Thank you. I have to go now. Goodbye!" - Peanorax said as he drove away in his Circus Peanut kart.  
  
"Goodbye!" - Jubie replied, then cheerfully turned to the main four. - "Guys, you got in here just in time, for we are about to start the Random Roster Race! I'll explain it later, when we get there. As for now - hop into your karts and get going!"  
  
And so optimistic Jubileena got into her vehicle and drove to the city, followed by our heroes and the licorice dragon with a gummy-bear chameleon on his head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And because I didn't write it in my fic, I write it here:  
> I gave each one of the Big Four's karts a name! Not the best ones, I know, but I write most of my story at school, so my brain isn't always in a working condition.  
> Hiccup: The Licorice Lightning (after his best friend, and because I always associate Night Furies with lightnings 'cuz of their speed)  
> Jack: The Peppermint Dream (a little reference to Owl City "Peppermint Winter")  
> Rapangel: Sweetie Belle (no reference to My Little Pony whatsoever)  
> MeriDough: The Sticky Wicket (don't ask me why)
> 
> Lorax characters belong to Universal Pictures and Illumination Entertainment  
> HTTYD and ROTG belong to Dreamworks  
> Tangled and WIR belong to Disney  
> Brave belongs to Disney/Pixar


	5. Something Glitchy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 4, where our heroes meet other racers and make a not-so-wonderful discovery.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, my writing skills are getting worse and worse... I never thought it'd be so hard to write in a non-native language! =( But still, to everyone who liked and followed my story - personal thankies and a royal bow! ^^ And a bit of the Sugar Rush king at the beginning.
> 
> Enjoy!
> 
> P.S. Sorry for a little OOC accidents sometimes...
> 
> P.P.S. I put only official racers from WIR, without the palette swaps of some of them.

Pure white bridge surrounded by tall trees with pink, yellow and orange cotton candy tops along it led up the hill to the huge castle as sugary white as the bridge. In fact, it's all made of sugar blocks. The front door, lit by two burning marshmallows on its both sides, was guarded by a trained army of Oreos. Inside, the countless halls and rooms were decorated with salmon carpets and curtains. Probably, there was a little too many of pink-related colors, but no one seems to actually care about it.

Greed-Pop was playing with a few gold coins on his personal little tray. They reflected brightly in his big dark goggles. He loved his coins more than anything else in the whole arcade. Well, maybe except for his little sister Vanellope. Greedy always took out his precious treasures in private and hated to be disturbed.

_Knock knock!_

The king immediately raised his head at the sound and put his grey tray away into the table. In his mind, he was more than glad that Peanorax has a good habit of knocking before entering.

"You can come in." - Greed-Pop said dryly.

The peanut lackey opened the door, which creaked quietly, and entered the king's cabinet holding papers about the new racers in his hands.

"I have some good news. We now have four more racers in our game. Here are their profiles." - he handled the schedule with four folders complete with the racers' portraits to the king.

Greed-Pop stood up from his chair and went to collect them. The first thing that you notice about the king of Sugar Rush is his height. He's 2.5 times taller than any of the racers, which gives him some kind of nobility compared to others. Green top hat decorated with lollipops of various flavors and sizes resembles a crown of sorts, brown hair messily sticking from underneath it, goggles hid his eyes and almost half of his face. He was dressed in a long dark-green coat, also decorated with small lollipop chain in the middle, black tie, green gloves, almost reaching his sleeves, black pants and shoes.

Studying the files, Greedy's mood was getting better and better. New racers means more contestants take part in racing. More contestants means more coins! More coins means... more coins! He quickly put the folders onto the desk.

"Thank you, Peanorax. That's definitely good news."

The king went back to his desk. As he sat, he asked his lackey:

"How's our prisoner?"

"Guarded and given the proper care," - the mustached peanut answered, - "just like you wanted."

"Good to know, good to know. You may go."

"Yes, your Candiness." - lackey made a little bow and exited the study.

Greed-Pop sighed and stood up one more time, this time to look at the beautiful portrait behind him. Portrait of his dear little sister Vanellope von Schweetz, wearing her royal gown: a large, pink and glittery long-sleeved gown with a pink, flowing cloak and white gloves. Her pink petticoat is noticeably covered in pink, white and red gumdrops with a few chocolate sprinkles at the bottom. The dress also had a lace collar with detailed designs of candy canes and lollipops over it. Princess's raven hair, wrapped in a bun, were covered in sprinkles with various shades of pink. On her head was a red tiara, and she was holding a pink lollipop scepter with a noticeable crown symbol over it. All of this obviously uncomfortable outfit is usually lying uselessly in Vanellope's wardrobe, for she really doesn't like this dress, in fact, almost hates it, preferring her favorite mint green hoodie with a brown skirt, green, white and purple striped leggings, and small black boots, only putting on this whole mass of pink on some important formal events.

Greedy was looking at this huge portrait in a golden frame and smiled deviously, baring his small but pointy teeth. For a split second the king's eyes were small, cat-like pebbles hidden behind his dark goggles, and a tall, human-like shadow crossed the room, whose evil laugh filled the air around it, but which no one could hear. No one, except for the king.

He turned back to his desk and took the folders, examining the faces of our four heroes.

'Why do I have a bad feeling about these four?..'

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Kids enjoyed themselves as they approached Sugar Rush Speedway, where all the other racers have already parked their karts. Jubileena parked her vehicle in a free spot between Swizzle Malarkey and Adorabeezle Winterpop. Hiccup, MeriDough, Rapangel and Jack stopped in a line behind them. Around them, along the track, were candy packets which served as spectator tribunes, which were filled with Sugar Rush citizens, who looked like candies with tiny bodies and arms, walking on equally miniature toothpick-like legs. In front of the karts was a big golden sigh saying "Start". On its left were two Jumbotrons. The four got out of their cars and approached others standing in a line on the right of the starting line, who've already noticed them and watched them curiously.

"Guys, come on here, you gotta meet everyone else!" - Jubie, waving her hand at our heroes, was as cheerful and joyful as ever. Kids calmly approached 6 girls and 3 boys. Still, their nervousness was totally obvious. - "I happily introduce you to our new fellow racers! Girls, these are Minty C. Hiccup, Jack Frosting, Rapangel Cake and MeriDough BunBroch."

A snorting sound came from behind Punzie, and everyone gasped in horror as the big black dragon raised his head above blondie's, a little tired but with emerald green eyes full of eager.

"Don't worry, Toothlice is completely harmless." - Hic said, scratching his friend underneath his chin. He was purring in satisfaction. - "He's my licorice dragon."

Then Pascal jumped from behind Toothlice's ears onto Mer's flock of fire red hair, turning strawberry flavored. Blondie carefully took him by his tail and placed onto her shoulder.

"And this is my gummy bear chameleon, Pascal."

Girls immediatly "Aww"ed from that whole amount of animal cuteness.

"So, now that you've introduced yourselves, it's time to finally get acquainted with everyone else." - Jubileena walked along the line, showing every other racer. She started with a strawberry-themed girl who was sucking a small lollipop. - "This is Taffyta Muttonfudge, our second best racer... That's Candlehead..."

"Hello..." - she said, looking at Hic with what seemed to be dreamy eyes.

"Say, what's with that candle on your helmet?" - Jack couldn't help but tease her a little. - "Someone's baked you in a birthday cake by accident and you decided to keep it as a memorial souvenier?"

Green-haired girl frowned as the prankster giggled at his own joke.

"Hey, good move there, man!" - a voice of a boy in the middle of the line was heard. - "Nice joke about that stick of hers!"

"Thanks." - Jack smile and came to the boy who had a pumpkin hat and shook his hand. - "Jack Frosting, ya heard my name just now."

"Gloyd Orangeboar." - he shook the white-hair's hand back. - "Welcome to my prankster's club!"

MeriDough and Rapangel shared quick smiles. As they say, birds of feather flock together.

"Alright, I go on. These are Rancis Fluggerbutter," - cherry-themed gurl carried on introducing her friends, - "Snowanna Rainbeau, Crumbelina DiCaramello, Swizzle Malarkey, Minty Zaki and Adorabeezle Winterpop."

Each of them shook their hands with our heroes.

"Oh, may I hug him? May I hug him, pleeeeeeease? - Beeze asked Hic, referring to Toothlice. He nodded in agreement, and an Eskimo-looking girl squeezed the dragon in a tight hug. Well, maybe a little too tight, for the poor creature's facial expression was clearly saying "Help me!"

"Wow, Vanellope would be so glad to meet you guys..." - Rancis's eyes suddenly fell down and a heavy sad sigh ran across the line and all of the tribunes.

"Who's Vanellope?" - Mer asked Taffyta.

"What?! You don't know Princess Vanellope?" - she was noticably furious, but then clapped herself on the forehead. - "That's right, you're newbies. Vanellope is our princess and the number 1 racer in the whole Sugar Rush."

"Yes, she's just so awesome." - Rancis's voice clearly showed his crush on her. - "But... she's missing. Nobody knows where she is."

"How long she's been missin'?"

"About 3 weeks or something." - Candlehead sounded almost teary.

Rapangel and her friends felt sorry for their new fellows. 'I hope she'll come back one day' - she thought to herself.

"Alright, let's leave all of our sadness behind for now. Now that you know each other, it's time to tell you about the Random Roster race, as I promised." - Jubileena pointed her finger at the Jumbotrons. - "Every evening we compete in the Random Roster race to represent Sugar Rush as tomorrow's avatars. To do so, you must be among the first nine racers to cross the finish line. The track itself is quite long, but to make it a bit easier for you, there are three main points of the road: Gumball Gorge, Birthday Cake Serpentine and Ice Cream Mountains. To enter the competition, you must pay one gold coin. Go on, take it out, every racer has one."

After a bit of search through their clothes, kids finally took out their coins.

"And so you just need to put it over here," - Taffyta pointed to a little round thing on her right, - "And your coin will be tossed into that Winner's Cup at the top. And ta-da! You're added to the board! I'll show you."

She put her coins onto the trigger and it sent that little golden piece of metal into the cup. As soon as it was inside, Taffy's name appeared on the board, followed by an announcer saying it out loud. As usual, she jumped up, saying her famous catchphrase "Stay Sweet!" Spectators sitting in a "Taffyta" tribune cheered her loudly.

"It's your turn now. Go on, give it a try." - Candle humbly let our heroes go forward. There was something about Hiccup that made her feel all wobbly inside. And besides, anyone who could befriend such a fierce creature as a dragon deserves respect.

The mint chocolate chip ice cream boy put his coin first. It was quickly sent up the starting sign and soon Hic's full name appeared on the board. Then it was MeriDough's time, and after her was Jack. Rapangel was the last one of the four to toss her coin. Now it was inside the metal Winner's Cup. And on the board appeared a name of...

"Punzie Sprinkles?!"

This was a true shock for everyone, especially for Rapangel. It wasn't her name. Has never ever been it! What was that "Punzie" doing on the board then?

"Girls, I can see only one explanation for it." - Taffyta suspiciously looked at her. - "Rapangel is a glitch!"

Spectators gasped in horror.

"Me? A glitch? Come on, it's not true! That's only a little mistake up there on the screen! You really believe I'm a..." - blondie didn't finish her sentence when her glance fell onto her tiny hands for a split second. They were slightly dissolved into a pinkish-purple code. So it is true! She's really glitchy, just like Taffyta just said!

"See? Told ya!" - the strawberry racer raised her head proudfully and scornfully looked at Punzie, who was now on the brink of tears, for the only things Taffy hated as much as losing were glitches. - "She can't be allowed to race!"

"I'm not a glitch!" - the cupcake racer tried to sound strong, even though her whole body was now ripping with pink pixels and tears started forming in her eyes. - "I've just got pixelexia, okay?" - she turned to her friends. - "Do you believe that liar?"

"Angel, calm down, please, you're only making it worse for yourself." - Jack tried to help Punzie a little somehow, but was rewarded with a frying pan pointed right at his nose.

"So you're now on Taffyta's side, too?" - blondie's frying pan was still pointed at the white-haired boy who stared at her, quite astonished. - "You believe her? Well, that's fine with me, traitor!"

"I'm not a traitor, Punzie, I..."

"You're a RAT! And I don't need you!" - she was now glitching all over her body, tears falling from her face. Angel hit Jack quite powerfully with her frying pan on his arm and ran away towards her kart. Pascal immediately jolted after her.

"Great, now you hurt her feelings." - the peppermint hot chocolate racer scowled at overly pinkish girl with a lollipop in her mouth, rubbing his aching limb.

"I only said the truth." - Taffyta was just as arrogant as she ever was. - "A glitch on the track is an accident just waiting to happen."

"Glitch or not, you apologize to her right now!"

"For the truth? No way!"

Taffy turned around to leave, but in the next second, to everyone's surprise, Jack grabbed the racer by her hot-pink jacket with his candy-cane crook, pulled her as closer as possible and stared right into her eyes, it seemed he was going to almost burning her alive with his stare. He wasn't going to let anyone offend his friend. Not now, not ever!

"Now listen to me, you little lollipop-sucker: second best racer or not, it doesn't give you any right to humiliate others only because of a mistake on the Score Board entry! AND it doesn't give you any right to pin her down just because of her glitching, _do you understand me? Or I should repeat it once again?_ "

Looking shocked from what just happened, Taffyta slightly nodded a couple of times. That was more than enough for Jack to let go of her.

"Okay, go to Angel and apolo..." - he turned around only to find Rapangel and her kart missing. Did she leave while he was dealing with that "Miss Strawberry Nose"? - "Where is she?"

Hiccup and MeriDough, still either startled by Jack's action or not understanding anything, pointed to their left. Rapangel drove away from here! Man, how couldn't he hear that stupid engine? Little prankster quickly jumped into his kart and moved into the direction his friends showed him, hoping he will be able to find her before it's too late.

"Listen, Hic, we gotta do somethin' fer Punzie, she's our friend anyway!" - Mer said to Hiccup, meanwhile surprised that this weird "Punzie" got so glued to her mind.

"You're right. What about a little gift? Flowers or something? And some candy?"

"Sounds good ter meh. But where are we gonna find 'em?"

The two looked around. There's not much to find in the valley. The hills won't do too. The last option was the Candy Cane Forest growing in the distance.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking, Sticky?"

"Most likely. C'mon, it shouldn't be far."

"Okay. Toothlice, come on, buddy!"

The dragon, whom, fortunately, Adorabeezle has already let go of, followed his human friends. Soon the two got into their karts and, along with their black reptile, moved towards the seemingly endless mass of peppermint trees. Behind them was Taffyta, watching them leave, definetely shocked. She then turned to Candlehead and Rancis.

"What was that just now?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, Rapangel in this fic is a little glitchy: if she's the fifth on the Score Board entry, she's "Punzie Sprinkles", all other times she's "Rapangel Cake" so she's not a real glitch; she only glitches like Vanellope does in the movie when overthrown with strong emotions like fear or rage. But don't worry, program doesn't take her as a mistake in the game.
> 
> Lorax belong to Universal Pictures and Illumination Entertainment  
> HTTYD and ROTG belong to Dreamworks  
> Tangled and WIR belong to Disney  
> Brave belongs to Disney/Pixar


	6. Sugary Sandman

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 5, in which Rapangel makes up with Jack, meets Sandy, and Jack discovers his unique ability.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man, I thought I'll never finish it! Well, the name says it all!  
> No MeriDough and Hiccup here, but the next chapter will be theirs for sure.

'How?.. How could he?'

Rapangel didn't know nor care where she was driving. The only thing she wanted was to get away. As far away as she could. Because of tears in her eyes, which were falling down her cheek, Punzie could hardly see the road, but it wasn't much of her concern. How could he?.. Jack would never do something like this, he wouldn't let her down. But he did... He believed that Barbie-looking brat... Believed she's nothing but a mere glitch... A mistake which wasn't even supposed to exist...

Her pinkish-purple glitching started travelling down to her kart, causing Angel to lose control over it. After making a few "gliding" maneuvers, she eventually crashed into a giant gumdrop.

"Well, it could be worse. Right, Pascal?" - she turned to see her chameleon sugary white from shock. - "Pascal?"

He only slightly peeped in response.

"It's okay now. Everything's alright." - Rapangel said, trying to calm Pascal down. - 'Or I shoulda say, sort of...'

In the end little reptile stopped panting and turned back to his green apple flavor.

Blondie looked around. Nothing but gumdrops of various sizes and colors and a mountain in the distance, which was shaped as a bottle of coke. The sky was full of cotton candy clouds. Punzie thought it to be a perfect place to stay for a while and be sad alone. No one around, so she wouldn't be disturbed. But how was she going to go back? Will figure out somehow, the girl decided. Right now she just wanted some peace and quiet to be alone with her sadness...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jack was following Rapangel's barely noticeable tracks of her "Sweetie Belle" on his "Peppermint Dream". He was already pretty far away from the main road, but he wasn't going to give up.

"Come on... Where are you?"

Very soon tracks became very strange. It seemed as the car got out of control. Jack's heart sank to his throat. Did Angel have a car accident? Is she alright? Pressing the gas pedal down as strongly as he could, he rushed along them, hoping he's really not too late.

Finding Punzie's kart didn't take long. It was standing in front of a huge purple gumdrop. But its owner wasn't inside, which in some way is good: at least it's possible to say she's alive and unharmed, for there was no one inside it except for her and Pascal on the moment she left. Jack looked around. Various gumdrops. Nothing unusual. He walked around towards the cola mountain. Again nothing odd. And then an almost silent singing sound reached Jack's ears. But it was so faint, he decided he was just imagining things. After he walked a little bit more, he heard a voice of someone singing again. But this time it was quite louder, so it couldn't be his imagination. It's her! Rapangel! Jack ran to the source of the sound and eventually saw her on a small sugar-covered marmalade, singing:

" _Maybe I've been here before_  
I know this room, I've walked this floor  
I used to live alone before I knew you  
I've seen your flag on the marble arch  
Love is not a victory march  
It's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah

 _Hallelujah, Hallelujah  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah..._ "

Without a doubt, Punzie's voice was beautiful, if not charming. Jack couldn't help but clap to her. Blondie turned her head and saw him.

"What are you doing here, traitor?"

"I'm telling you, Angel, I'm not a traitor, it's just a big..."

"You believed her, Jack! Believed that selfish little brat!" - Rapangel defiantly turned away from him. - "What do you have to say for yourself?"

"Please..."

"Wait, I don't want to hear it. I'm not talking to you!"

"Would you let me say at least a word?" - he was slowly starting to lose his patience. - "It's just a big misunderstanding."

"No, it's not! You said so yourself: not admitting I'm a glitch was going to make it worse for me!"

"That's not what I meant! I only wanted you to calm down so you wouldn't glitch so much. You're still my friend. Punzie Sprinkles or not, I like you for what you are."

Punzie slowly raised her eyes at him. "You do?"

"Of course I do!" - Jack nodded, smiling. - "If it wasn't true, would I go all the way here for you?"

She managed a shy smile. How could she be so silly? Taking meaningless accusations over her own friend...?

"Thank you, Jack." - she said, giving him a hug. At first the racer was quite surprised, but then hugged her back.

Blondie friendly patted him on the shoulder and turned around, only to see a smiling person, looking at them. Both of them slightly jumped in surprise. The man was about the same height as the racers were, his clothes and plump body completely made of cone sugar, locks of short hair sticking out in every direction. He waved his tiny hand to Jack and Rapangel.

"Hello, mister." - she smiled back and drew out her hand. Above the man's hat appeared a sugar-made hat, same color as he was, which he took off with his left hand and slightly bowed, greeting our two heroes. They opened their mouths in amazement. And in the next second the hat disappeared as fast as it appeared. Then the man shook Punzie's hand. 

"Nice to meet you too. I'm Rapangel, and he's Jack." - she pointed to her friend. They both shook each other's hands. - "What's your name?"

The smile on person's face faded, and he looked down at his feet, as tiny as his hands.

"Is something wrong?" - Jack asked him, looking puzzled. Another image appeared above the man's head, showing crossed lips.

"You… can't speak?" - Rapangel suggested. The little man nodded. - "Oh, that's so sad."

"Well, we can give him a name ourselves. If he doesn't mind, of course."

The speechless person didn't seem to be against that idea. 

"Great! Now, what about..." - the white-haired racer wanted it to be nice, not offensive and tell a bit about the person whose name it was going to be. He thought about it for a minute, not coming up with a suitable one. Then suddenly his glance fell onto the cone sugar robes of the man. - "… a Sugarman?"

Punzie giggled at that idea. "Sugarman? That sounds awfully "heroic" to me. Hey, speaking of them, can you do, like, magic or something?"

The man smiled and nodded. At that moment Pascal, who was on blondie's shoulder for all this time, went down her arm to take a closer look at the stranger. He friendly patted him on the head, to which the small reptile responded in turning orange flavored. Then the cone sugar person sprinkled a little bit of sugar from his hand above the chameleon, and he fell asleep on Rapangel's hand, quietly snoring. Both kids "Wow"ed in astonishment. And I think I can say that exactly at that second their minds crossed. They came up with a perfect name for this little person.

"Sugary Sandman!" - both Jack and Rapangel said simultaneously, looking at each other, which was quickly followed by their bright laugh.

"I like it. Sounds nice, if you ask me." - blondie smiled.

"But let's see if our new friend likes it, shall we?" - white-haired boy said and turned to him. - "What do you think?"

The man smiled joyfully, raised his thumbs and created a tick above his head. No doubt about that, he accepted it.

"Great! Nice to meet you, Mr. Sandman!" - the girl shook Sandy's hand again. Sandy shook it back. Then his glance fell at Jack's candy cane crook he was holding in his hand for all this time. Curious, he came closer to take a better look.

"Ah, that's just my candy cane crook. Nothing special, take a look if you want." - the racer calmly handled his "staff" to the sandman. He twirled it in his hands for a while, sometimes looking back at the crook's owner. Then all of a sudden Sandy gave it back to Jack and pointed to the closest small gumdrop.

"Okay, now you lost me here. What do you want me to do?" - the Peppermint Hot Chocolate racer asked the sugar made sandman. Once again, he created another image above his head, the picture of few snowflakes this time. - "Wait, you want me to _freeze_ it or something?"

Sandy energetically nodded, smiling widely.

"Look, I don't want to offend you, Mr. Sandman, but I told you there's nothing interesting about this striped piece of caramel." - the boy gave Sandy a skeptic look, to which the sandman responded in putting his hands on his waist and tilting his head a bit with a persuading look, which was probably saying "You won't know until you try."

"Alright, alright, I'll try." - Jack poked the sugar-covered marmalade with his crook a couple of times. Nothing happened. - "See? No result. I'm telling you, it won't do anything magical even if I..."

Jack's sentence broke at that moment, for the gumdrop was now covered in a frost-like glaze. It was playing with pastel light blue glitter. Everyone, except for Sandy, backed away a little in shock. Amazed, the candy cane crooked boy touched another gumdrop with it. It also got covered in pastel pink glaze. He now touched the ground with it. The frost spreaded around in every direction, stopping right underneath Rapangel's feet. She smiled in happiness and surprise.

A huge smile crossed Jack's face. It's amazing! He had control over such a great power! He joyfully started running around the gumdrop field, leaving a path of glaze behind him. Meanwhile, Sandy made a sugary guitar for himself and started playing some lively music on it, which made this moment even more magical and unique.

"Wow! I didn't know you can do it, Jack!" - Punzie screamed to him, overjoyed from all the magic frost surrounding her underneath her feet.

"Neither did I!" - he screamed back, laughing wholeheartedly as he kept running among the various marmalades, half of them now covered in frost-like iridescent glaze. He ran and ran, ran and ran around, smiling, full of joy and love of life, twirling and jumping, bringing more frost and fun into the land and open air, which was filled with happy music played by sugary sandman. Jack finally stopped in front of Rapangel and Sandy, looking at his work of art: most of the valley was now faintly glittering under the game sun.

"Woohoo! I've never had so much fun in my life!" - he was now panting from so much activity.

Blondie carefully put Pascal onto her shoulder and clapped to the boy, her face crossed with a sweet smile. "It's so beautiful!"

Sandy's face clearly said: "Told you so."

"Alright, I admit it. This is pretty cool." - Jack said, holding his candy cane crook. - "It's... ama--"

Suddenly, he slipped on the icy glaze underneath his feet and fell flat onto his back.

"--zing. Ooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwww!!!!!!!" - the white-haired boy rubbed his now aching head.

Punzie gasped in horror and gave Jack a hand, helping him to get up. "Are you okay?"

A picture of a bone broken in half appeared above Sandy's head, worried expression on his face.

"Don't worry, I'm fine." - the boy reassured her, still rubbing the back of his head. - "No broken bones, fortunately."

Rapangel sighed in relief. She looked at the bottle-shaped mountain in the distance. "So, what do we do now?"

Sandman shrugged his shoulders, but in the next second a cone sugar arrow above his head was pointing into the direction of that mountain.

"Jack, I think he wants to show us something." - Punzie told him.

"Okay, Mr. Sandman," - he turned to the sugar man, - "but just let us get our cars first and then you can show us, well, whatever you want to show us, okay?"

Sandy nodded in agreement.

"Thank you." - now Jack faced blondie. - "Come on, we can't just leave them behind, can we? I still remember where they are!"

Kids ran away to get their vehicles, and after five minutes they were following Sandy around the glazed ground to the Diet Cola Mountain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to give a small hint of Jackunzel here, but I guess they're unnoticeable. I'm not a romantic person, really.  
> Yes, in my fic I have Jackunzel and Merricup. I like them. And I like Jarida and Hiccunzel too.
> 
> The song Rapangel sings here is Hallelujah by Rufus Wainwright from Shrek.
> 
> Plus, I suggest listening to "Forbidden friendship" from HTTYD or "Shut Up and Drive" from WIR at the moment when Jack runs around in joy, freezing everything. For a better effect.
> 
> ROTG belongs to Dreamworks  
> Tangled and WIR belong to Disney
> 
> P.S. I won't be able to visit AO3 often for a long while (unless my parents allow me to use their PC) so until I earn enough money by working at a part-time job in June to buy my own netbook, updates may be delayed. =(


	7. E. Aster Bunnymund

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 6, in which Hic and Mer meet the keeper of the Candy Cane Forest

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, this chapter is whole MeriDough, Hiccup and Toothlice here! I'll try to continue soon!  
> I wanted it be longer, actually, but I put myself limits to write chapters between 2000 and 2500 words. I hope my next one will fit into at least 1000!  
> And some people may complain about grammatical or some other errors in my fanfic, to that I say this: as I wrote earlier in description, English isn't my native language (it's Russian, actually) and I'm also still a pupil, so it's normal for a person of my kind to make mistakes sometimes. I'm not saying you're rude, just want you to be a bit more tolerate towards non-English speaking people.

**_Meanwhile…_ **

At the edge of the Candy Cane Forest, Hiccup and MeriDough have just parked their "Licorice Lightning" and "Sticky Wicket" on the roadside.

"Well, here we are." - Hic said, looking at the seemingly endless mass of striped peppermint trees, ones not really different from others. Toothlice unintentionally licked his lips at the sight of so many caramels.

"Well, what're we waitin' fer? Come on, let's go! Flowers won't magically fall out o' nowhere!" - Mer energetically walked into the forest, followed by the boy and his dragon. 

After 15 minutes of wandering around they came upon a surprisingly big clearing full of marzipan flowers, tiny chocolates and several lollipop trees. On their right was an about 30-32 feet tall cake-like cliff with a tea waterfall flowing down it. Hiccup collected enough flowers and a few small candy canes, which, fortunately, fitted into MeriDough's arrow container. The licorice dragon caught some fish-shaped cookies for himself in the tea river.

But at the moment when the Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream racer wanted to head back to his kart, Sticky decided to test her climbing skills by climbing on the top of the Teafalls.

"Sticky, what are you doing? It's time to go back, now!"

But she didn't listen to him, only kept climbing higher and higher, almost fell down a couple of times, but didn't give up. And something about her determination made the boy feel some sort of respect towards Mer. As soon as she climbed up, she looked around. The scenery was simply breathtaking. The Honey-Bun racer couldn't help but laugh loudly in excitement and then shoot an arrow into one of the closest lollipop trees as a victory stroke. It's probably way too obvious she hit the bullseye, but considering the fact that it's a height of 32 feet, it makes this some kind of a feat. 

"Hey, Lara Croft!" - someone called her. MeriDough looked down and realized it was Hic. Man, he looked so small from such a height! - "How do you think you're gonna get down, huh?"

One thing I can say certainly: MeriDough BunBroch is no scaredy cat! She just carefully climbed down the same way she got up.

"O-okay, that was… impressive." - the brownhead managed a half smile as the red headed archer wiped her hands with her dress. - "So are we going back _now_?"

The girl checked her container. Everything was undamaged, so she nodded. 

"Phew, finally." - Hiccup let out a sigh of relief and turned around, only to find his reptile sidekick moving deep into the forest. - "Where the heck is he going?"

The two immediately followed Toothlice. But, as it often happens when you chase a fast-moving animal in an unknown place where everything seems to be completely alike, they ended up getting lost, now being Motherboard-knows-where and up to their waists in a taffy swamp.

"Toothlice, you useless licorice!" - Hiccup cried out loud as the sneaky black dragon with ears and claws decorated with red stripes jumped up the candy cane tree and swinged upside down near the base of one of its branches, watching the two racers curiously. What was more insulting is that this animal wholeheartedly believed they were playing with him! That this is all just one weird chasing game!

Then he heard something. Footsteps. They were coming from a fair distance, but dragons have a very keen canine sence of smell and hear, so they can hear faint sounds being a few miles away from their source. Toothlice's ears perked up at once, he carefully slided off the branch to the lower one and stared into the mass of peppermint trees, his eyes and slits narrowed, his whole body seemed to be intense.

"What's wrong, buddy?" - Hic shouted to him, and in the next second Mer hit him in the stomach with her elbow.

"Will yeh be quiet?" - she hissed to him, having the bowstring of her bow pulled, ready to shoot an arrow into any unlucky foe who happened to mess with her and her friends!

Soon the kids heard it too. Someone was coming! Toothlice prepared to bounce at the stranger at any moment. And that moment happened when a tall shadowy figure with long ears and a what seemed to be a boomerang came pretty close to the taffy swamp our two friends were still stuck in. 

"Taste!" - the redhaired racer shot her arrow right into the tree the stranger was hiding behind, and that's when the dragon pounced from the branch towards the creature. It was a surprise for him, so he jumped forward and tossed his weapon into the animal. Hiccup's eyes widened in horror. That thing can hurt or even kill his best friend, and he could do nothing about it because of this stupid green puddle of… of… whatever it is! But somehow - miraculously maybe - the boomerang missed Toothlice by a mere inch! The mysterious person watched in shock as the magnificent reptile, whom even his trusty weapon couldn't stop, landed onto the ground with a muffled " _thump_ ". In a blink of an eye, the dragon had the poor creature underneath his paw, roaring at him. At first he looked frightened, but then, all of a sudden, a sly smirk crossed his face, because, unbeknown to Toothlice, this person still had a trick up in his sleeve. 

And it worked.

As many people know, boomerangs have an amazing ability to return to its tosser after a little bit of time if it doesn't hit its target. Unfortunately, Toothlice wasn't one of those "many people". And it turned against him when the weapon, whose owner somehow seemed to look like a giant rabbit walking on his hind legs, whooshed right next to MeriDough and powerfully slammed the dragon into his face. That was enough for the rabbit to push Toothlice's paw aside and get out from underneath it. While the winged reptile was getting back to his sences, the mysterious person sprinted towards our two kids and pulled them out of the taffy swamp.

"There ya go, kiddos! You okay? No one hurt?" - he asked Hic and Mer with Australian accent noticeable in his voice. They simultaneously shook their heads.

Well, at least they knew this person is friendly and doesn't mean any harm. He actually _was_ a big rabbit, two times taller than our heroes, with grayish-blue fur, flower-like imprints on both his forehead and shoulders, and bright green eyes. He wore leather bracers set with orange stones, a single-strap holster with which he probably carries his boomerangs, one of which was still on his back, and leather wrappings on his feet.

This peacefull moment was quickly ruined by Toothlice's roar, and, boy, was he furious!

"Kids, find a safe place to hide, now! I'll take care of that overgrown ankle-biter!" - the rabbit slightly pushed the racers towards the trees, facing the fierce creature. - "You don't want to race a rabbit, mate!"

He ran forward towards his second boomerang, but the dragon's no less quick jump and a strong smash with his long tail knocked him off his feet. Toothlice was on top of the rabbit again. But this time he wanted to finish him off for sure by simply blasting his face with a fair amount of molten sugar. Just one strong inhale and…

"TOOTHLICE, LET GO OF HIM!"

The voice of his best friend Toothlice couldn't mistake with anyone else's. He looked at Hiccup. His whole face was red from anger and frustration. The dragon looked at the boy with innocent eyes, like, "Why are you looking at me like that? He wanted to attack you, I know it!"

"I said: _let him go_." - the Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream racer repeated, emphasizing on the last three words. With a guilty expression all over his face, Toothlice raised his paw away from the rabbit. Slightly panting, he got up on his feet. 

"Did… Did that… ankle-biter follow your… command just now?" - he stared at the boy with the eyes full of disbelief.

"Yeah. Toothlice is my dragon, actually. And he's smart enough to understand human speech, even though he doesn't pay much attention to words unless they were mine, for at times I'm the only one he actually listens to." - the brown head said and came closer to his black friend to scratch him behind his striped ear a little. - "And I'm sorry for what happened earlier. He was just being protective. Oh, by the way, my name is Hiccup, and hers is MeriDough, but we sometimes call her Sticky."

"Ah, I forgive you, kiddo. If I were him, I'd do the same thing. Right, big fella?" - the rabbit friendly patted the dragon on his shoulder. He gave him a "yeah, I guess you're right" kind of look. - "And name's E. Aster Bunnymund, but you kids can call me Bunny."

"E. Aster… Like an… Easter Bunny?" - Sticky asked him. Bunny nodded, smiling. At first the archer stared at him for a few moments in surprise, but then started, like, examining him with a disbelieving expression.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothin', really, but… I always thought an Easter Bunny is somewha'…" - the girl tried to find an appropriate word. - "mmmm… smaller er somethin'?"

The rabbit let out a frustrating sigh. Looks like she wasn't the first one to say this, and it was certainly getting on his nerves.

"Look, I'm not all that "cute and cuddly" people think I am, kiddo! Of course I do have a soft side in me, but I'm no plush toy, I've got a forest to take care of, and it's not all easy-peasy, should you know!.."

" _Okay_ , okay, got it." - Hic raised his arms in a stopping gesture. - "No ordinary rabbit. Understood, thank you."

"Good. So, what brought ya here, kids?"

MeriDough started retelling the whole story from the point when they entered the Random Roster race.

"…but b'cause of a _certain_ someone," - it was obvious who she was referring to, - "we ended up gettin' lost and stuck in tha'… thing. Wha' is it, by th' way?"

"It's a taffy swamp, there are lots of 'em around here." - Bunny answered in a casual way. - "Well, looks like you kiddos need a guide around here, and I can help you out. No one knows this forest better than me, so I'll get you back to the track by the closest shortcut."

The rabbit walked among the numerous striped peppermint trees, our two heroes and their dragon not far behind. Right now they could only rely on his experience and knowledge of the forest.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Are we there yet?"

They've been walking for only 10 minutes, but for kids it seemed like forever. From all the white and red stripes wherever they looked they felt dizzy.

"We'll be there soon, kiddos. Don't stay behind!" - Bunny tried to encourage them somehow, but it didn't really work. 

Then a sparkle appeared in Mer's eyes.

"Hey, yeh kno' wha'? I'm gonna climb up there an' take a bett'r look! Oh, Sugar Honey Iced Tea, how didn' I think o' tha' b'fore?!" - she asked herself as she started jumping from one tree branch to another, higher and higher to the top. - "Shouldn't be harder than climbin' up a cliff."

"Alright, let's see how this works." - the rabbit commented on that. And in just a second his face was crossed with a slight smirk. - "I wouldn't grab that branch if I were you, kiddo."

"Oi, c'mon, wha's so special about--"

"It's a double-stripe."

As soon as he said it, the double-striped branch in her hand dissappeared, and the poor girl fell a couple of levels lower, catching another candy cane for her dear life. Hiccup winced at that sight and Toothlice… chuckled? Well, it's no average dragon to you, what did you expect?

"Double-stripes break!"

Mer only rolled her eyes and continued climbing, now being more careful about which branch she wanted to grab. Quite soon she was on the top of the tree. 

"Do you see anything?" - Hic shouted to her. 

The redhead looked around. To her surprise, the surroundings were pretty much the same as on the ground, only there was more sky above her and in the horizon was a faint silhouette of a castle. 

"Nothin', really. Same as below." - the Honey Bun racer was disappointed. Her idea turned out to be a simple waste of time. But something caught her eye. - "Except fer…"

"Except for what?"

"…umm, Hic, you'd better turn around."

Bunny and Hiccup turned around and saw that Toothlice was missing. Again. Man, what's wrong with this reptile? 

"Toothlice, you useless piece of licorice, come here at once! We're not playing with you!" - the racer ran into the direction he thought his dragon went to. And he didn't mistake, for he saw his reptile running somewhere else, so he followed his licorice "pet". Quite soon, after numerous tries to keep up with this overly playful animal and countless attempts to make him go back, they appeared in the unknown part of the forest, where white and red stripes changed into yellow and purple ones.

"Okay, buddy, just don't go anywhere right now, okay?" - Hic tried to approach the dragon, who was still eager to play. That animal sure has a lot of energy in himself! - "We've had enough problems because of you, so be a good dragon and…"

But it was too late. Toothlice jumped from one branch to another and crossed a pit underneath him. The boy let out a groan and decided to cross it with the candy cane, lying between its sides.

'Okay, Hic, you can do it… Just hope it's not gonna be a--'

Unfortunately, it was, and it disappeared right under his feet, and the poor boy fell down and got stuck to his hips in a some sort of a… quicksand? Probably, as he was slowly getting sucked deeper and deeper into it!

"What the…?" - the brown-head looked around and saw a sign saying "Danger! Nesquik-sand!" - "Nesquik-sand?! You've gotta be kidding me!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HTTYD and ROTG belong to Dreamworks  
> WIR belongs to Disney  
> Brave belongs to Disney/Pixar


	8. More Peppermint Troubles!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 7, in which Hiccup is freed from the dangerous Nesquik-sand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally I finished it! Not having a PC at home is a total f***!
> 
> ... And once again I try to bring some humour into my candy-themed fanfic and make sure everyone sounds 'in-character'. Hope I did well. And I want to thank a person from FanFiction nicked GuardianKeeper who gave me the idea to bring Guardians here in the first place. By this I mean that you have full freedom to give me some of your ideas, and maybe it will end up in the final fic!
> 
> Enjoy!

Hiccup sadly looked up at the yellow-purple peppermint trees with marshmallow tops, growing really high above him. Such an irony - death from drowning in a bunch of chocolate only a few hours after being unlocked! He didn't even take part in a real race! There's so much for him to discover, so much to try, so much to do at least! He was too young to die!

"HELP!" - the poor boy had nothing to do but shout for help. - "ANYONE! I'M DOWN HERE! HELP ME, PLEASE!"

But the only creature to respond was Toothlice, who looked at his friend from the edge of the pit.

"Toothlice! Find some help! Please, I don't wanna die!" - the reason for Hic's panicking was obvious, besides, the sand's already sucked him to the base of his legs.

The dragon watched him, wanted to help but can't - pretty high, and no one would like to become another corpse in there! Poor thing started darting around: what to do, what to do? No rope, no vines, no branches even! Oh, who cares about that, none of them is even long enough to reach the boy! C'mon, think, think, think! Wait... Idea! Toothlice jumped up onto one of the nearby tree and roared in his highest vocals. And then again. Once more, hoping that the sound will be heard by those who, as he believed, weren't too far away.

Speaking of them, MeriDough and Bunny have just reached the territory of yellow-purple candy cane trees.

"Ah, I know this place." - the rabbit sighs dreamily. - "Home of the most delicious marshmallows in the whole game. You can also find some wonderful Laffy-Taffys... and a Nesquik-sand pit."

"Wha' did yeh say?" - lools like Mer didn't pay any attention to him.

"I said..." - Bunny didn't finish because he heard a roar coming from somewhere deep withing the forest. The girl heard it too. It was unmistakable. If you heard it at least once, you'll always recognize it. The two immediately followed the sound and soon came to the edge of a deep long hollow with a clearly panicking animal on another side.

"Sacred sugar cones, wha' the heck are yeh doin' out there? Get yeh candy butt here, right now!" - MeriDough waved her hand to herself, making Toothlice try to jump over to her, but at the last minute he refused, stopping at its very end.

"Hmm, is he alright?" - the rabbit asked himself.

"Umm, excuse me? Little help here?" - a familiar voice came from below. The two looked down and saw Hiccup in the middle of the Nesquik-sand pit, fear written all over his face.

"Hic! Are yeh okay?" - Mer asked worriedly.

"Yeah, I'm fine! Never been better!" - he started rather sarcastically and angrily. - "Always dreamed of _drowning in a chocolate milk mix!_ "

"Alright, alright, no need to panic, mate, we'll get you out. Somehow." - Bunny reassured him in a soft Australian way surfers may do.

"You'd better hurry..." - the boy was sure getting more and more nervous - the chocolate powder was now up to his waist.

Bunny looked around, muttering something under his breath, something about a rope maybe. But where was he going to get it in the middle of the forest? The dragon wasn't doing anything useful too. And what kind of friend was that creature, he didn't even try to fly and rescue his sort of master! Wanting to be at least of some use, Mer decided to talk with Hic a little so he would calm down.

"How did yeh act'lly get 'here, lad?" - Sticky asked him.

"I followed Toothlice, tried to cross this, fell down. End of story." - he relied, arms crossed on his chest, which was almost in the Nesquick-sand. Yeah, that definetely wasn't of much use. - "Anything else to say? No?" - even before the racer answered, he continued being miserable, supported with Toothlice's quiet wincing. - "Well, I guess that's it. I never thought I'd end my life here. I didn't even win at least one winner's cup! I would've shown that lollipop lady who's the king of the track!"

"You mean Taffyta?" - MeriDough specified, though she already knew who Hiccup was referring to. He nodded.

"Yeah, that miss 'I Know It All!' Who does she think she is? Queen of Candyland?" - the brown-head came up with an idea to mock her and her attitude a little. It won't hurt while she's not around here, am I right? - "Hey! How do you like that? _Look at me! I'm the second-best racer of this giant mash up of candies and shmandies, so I decide who's to race and who's not! All hail me! I'm so sweet, everyone around me starts feeling sick and having a toothache! Lollipops rule!_ "

The Honey Bun racer couldn't help but laugh out loud. She even chortled once, but didn't mind it. Man, if Hic was on stage right now, he would be surrounded by numerous claps and "Bravo!"s! It really was hilarious! And it looks like she's not the only one to think so, because bright small and slightly high-toned laughs were heard from above. Everyone rose their heads and saw weird purple vines growing down towards the pit. There were about two dozens of them, and they all were laughing!

"Hey! These are Laffy-Taffys!" - Bunny said happily.

"Laffy-wha'?" - Mer asked him. Looks like she clearly didn't hear him say it a few minutes ago.

"They're attracted to whatever they think to be funny!" - the keeper of the Candy Cane Forest explained to the little girl. And that's when his light-bulb of ideas lit. - "Hey, kiddo, looks like they enjoyed your show! Keep them entertained so they can grow long enough to get you outta that pit! It's your only chance to survive!"

"But whom should I mimic? There's not a lot of people I can..." - Hic got lost quite easily.

"Oh, wee lamb. Whoever yeh wan', ice cream hat!" - Sticky got surprised he didn't realize it until now. - "Even Justin Bieber, I don't kno'!"

"Who's that guy?"

"I don't care! Yeh wanna live er not?"

The Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream racer nodded energetically, no one in his place would like to die, right? And you know what? It gave him some inspiration for a bit of purpose "dying poet" overacting. I can say that at this point his imagination went wild, and he did a lot of parodying, his best one, I think, was a "damsel in distress" acting. And mixed with Toothlice reparodying Hic from one of the branches behind him made it all double amusing! He almost mimicked Bunny at one point, but quickly changed to another action. As for Laffys? They were dying from laugh! Not literally, of course. Same for the red-head also.

"Oi, are these... things stretchable?" - MeriDough asked Bunnymund after regaining her consciousness from so much laughing.

"Yeah, quite stretchable, I believe." - he answered.

"Thanks." - the only word she said before running towards the pit and catching one of the vines in mid-jump. Just like the rabbit said, it stretched, and the girl, holding the Laffy, quickly flew down toward the brown-haired boy.

"Grab meh hand, Hic!"

He reached out to her hand and, luckily, managed to grab it tightly enough to get out of the Nesquik-sand when the Laffy Taffy pulled them up. During the lift, Hiccup's eyes locked at MeriDough's, and vice versa. They just couldn't stop looking at each other for some reason... Only when the two landed on one of the peppermint branches the boy reluctantly let go of her lovely big blue eyes. He looked down. Deep beneath him was a mass of chocolate powder. Strange, if he stayed there for another 10 minutes... Brr.

"Well... Ladies go first, I suppose?" - Hic adressed Mer. She smiled and slided down the yellow and purple candy cane. In mid-jump she grabbed one of the marshmallows, which grew low enough for her to take one, and successfully landed onto the ground. The brown-head soon joined her. It didn't take long for Toothlice to joyfully pounce onto his friend and start licking his face.

"Okay, okay, get off of me, Toothlice!" - he said while laughing, and when Hic got on his feet, he wiped all the saliva off his face.

"Well, looks like you're alright there, kiddo!" - Bunny addressed him delightfully.

"Uhh... How did yeh get here?" - Sticky was surprised to see him here, because he was standing behind her when she ran for the vine.

"Swung over it by the Laffy Taffy. Nice idea, actually." - he patted her on the shoulder. - "Now c'mon, kids, we'll leave this place soon enough."

MeriDough was about to follow Bunny, when she heard Hiccup behind her saying: "Umm... Mer..." unsurely. She turned around and faced him.

"Thanks for... saving me there..." - he nodded to the pit, nervously fingering his cap in his palms all this time.

"Oi, it's a'right, Hic." - she smiled back, slightly blushing. The boy smiled back and put his hat back on.

"Kids, you coming or not?" - they heard Bunnymund shout from withing the forest. The two, along with Toothlice, quickly ran to the rabbit, eager to finally get out of here.

"B'sides, it was yeh idea tha' actually did the trick. Yeh're an awesome actor, I swear on meh arrows!" - the red-haired girl said to Hic, making him humbly rub his head. After that she put the marshmallow in her hand into her container, checking its contents in process. Everything seemed to be undamaged.

"She's right, kiddo, you really belong in a theater!" - the rabbit supported the red-head. - "You've got brilliant parodying skills! Still, it wouldn't have hurt you if you'd actually sunk to the bottom, you would've simply regenerated back at the edge of that pit and the only problem would've been finding a way to cross it."

Bunny turned around to see if our racers weren't too far behind and saw the kids frozen in place like totem poles, deadpanned.

"Why are you staring at me like that? You can't die in your own game, didn't you know it?"

The two stood with their eyes wide open for another second, then cried in unison: "WHAT?"

"Couldn't you say so earlier?" - Hiccup shouted frustratedly at him. What did he mean by it? All of his hard work was useless?

"I wanted to, but I was so caught up in your performance..." - Bunnymund chuckled and gave a small smile. - "I guess I just forgot about it."

Little did the keeper of the forest know that there was someone else behind him. Someone who understood his every single word and didn't like what he said one bit. Anger crossed his black licorice face. Filled with desire for revenge, that someone grabbed Bunny by his leather single-strap holster and hung him on the closest tree branch, taking his two boomerangs as well.

"Uh-oh, looks like you've driven Toothlice mad. That's not good news." - the Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream racer stated with a sly smirk on his face. Fortunately for Bunny, the candy cane he was hung on turned out to be another double-stripe, so he quickly fell to the ground, but the dragon was high among the tree tops by that time. Determined to get his property back, the rabbit started jumping up the peppermint branches to take his stuff back and show that animal who's the boss!

"Hmm, who's gonna win?" - Hic said, smelling the oncoming competition between the two. - "I vote for Toothlice."

"Then I vote fer Bunny." - Sticky replied. - "Ter make it all fair."

They shared a brother-fist and watched the dragon and the rabbit in a crazy race among the purple and yellow candy canes, which slowly turned to red and white ones. Feeling a strong contestant, licorice reptile went for his crowned move - using one of the tree tops, he jumped into the open air and flew above Bunnymund, his eyes saying: "Not this time, rabbit!"

"Well, I guess the dragon won." - MeriDough stated unemotionally.

But Toothlice's happiness was short lived. He only flew a few feet away from the rabbit when he suddenly lost control of his flight and with a loud roar of fear promptly fell right into the numerous candy cane branches!

"TOOTHLICE!" - Hiccup's heart skipped a beat. Without a second thought he darted towards his reptile, not even caring about the various obstacles in his path, the boy only wanted to get to him as quickly as he could, hoping his dragon is alright and didn't break any bones.

He followed to the sound of breaking caramels and quite soon found the licorice animal lying in a mass of broken branches, two boomerangs still in his mouth. Pain and suffering filled his sorrowful emerald eyes, and that made his boy even more worried.

"Are you okay, buddy?" - he asked, examining Toothlice. No signs of broken bones or open wounds. At least some good news. But as soon as he touched his front paws, he winced from pain and slightly drew his limps aside. That's when Bunny and Sticky came.

"Wha' happened? Is he hurt?" - Mer asked, no less worried than Hic.

"I'll check it all out, don't you worry." - Bunnymund reassured him and started checking out Toothlice the way Hic did not so long ago, retrieving his a bit drooled boomerangs as well. After a little while he turned to our duo. - "He's pretty much okay, no wounds or such, but he hurt his paws quite bad, I gotta say. Gonna be limping till tomorrow for sure."

The kid's mood went downright terrible, same for the licorice dragon. The brown head came closer to his best friend and gave him a hug, gently striking his head. Toothlice purred in response. Seeing all of this sadness hurt MeriDough from inside.

"I'll go find the closest road so we can take him ter... well, animal hospital o' sorts, 'kay?" - she said and went away, just because she couldn't stay there any longer or else she would certainly shed a tear or two. The keeper of the forest nodded approvingly.

"Don't you worry, big fella, everything's gonna be alright." - Bunny patted the dragon on the shoulder and took an egg out of his holster. It was blue with green spiral from top to bottom. - "Here, eat it. It'll numb your pain a little. It's chocolate."

Toothlice sniffed the egg and then carefully ate it from the rabbit's palm. The rabbit and the racer stayed beside him for another minute, so the poor thing would have some mental support.

"Hey, I forgot to tell you, kiddo." - Bunnymund suddenly spoke to Hiccup. - "His left tail-fin is missing. Maybe it was torn off during his crash landing."

"Not exactly." - the boy's answer kind of surprised him. - "It's always been like that. Probably the programming wasn't finished or was simply forgotten, and now he can't fly because of this."

"Like, at all?"

"At all."

"Oh. Okay, help me lift him up."

Hic nodded, and the two, Bunny mostly, helped the dragon get back to his feet. He was feeling better, but still winced quietly when he stepped on his right front paw. Not wanting his licorice reptile to cause any more pain, the brown head put it onto his shoulder, hoping it would help at least a little bit. The keeper of the forest smiled at the two - they were true friends indeed.

"LADS! LADS!" - a shout was heard from nearby, and soon MeriDough ran out, panting. - "I... I found... phew... found the road... not so far from here... And I found our karts... C'mon, they're just down th' hill!"

"Coming!" - Hiccup said back and he, along with Bunny, helped Toothlice slowly walk out of the forest and down to their cars. It took about 8 minutes to do it. After that the poor dragon with a little support from kids somehow climbed onto the back side of Hic's vehicle. Now there was only one thing left - find Rapangel and give her their present. This shouldn't be a serious problem. Waving goodbye to Bunnymund, the racers made sure both the flowers and the dragon were somewhat fine and started the karts. But just as they wanted to leave, the two heard beeping coming from the road. It was gradually becoming louder and louder, and soon a cupcake-styled car with various decorations and cherry-shaped wheels came into view. Hic and Mer smiled with their widest smiles, because they knew - only one racer in the whole game has such a colorful kart!

"Punzie!" - Sticky shouted joyfully as the blond girl approached them in her "Sweetie Belle".

"Hiccup! MeriDough!" - she was no less happy to see her friends. - "I'm so happy to see you guys! I've been looking for you everywhere!"

"We're happy to see you too." - the brown-haired boy gave her a friendly hug, so did the red head. - "Oh, we have a surprise for you."

"For me? Really?"

Both kids nodded, and Hiccup took out of Mer's arrow container collected flowers, few tiny candy canes and a marshmallow.

"For our sweetest friend of all times!" - he said, giving her their present. - "We want to tell you that no matter what evil tongues say about you, we will always be with you."

"Yep, Punzie Sprinkles er not, yeh're still our friend, and nothin's gonna change it." - Sticky agreed with him, smiling. - "An' besides, nobody else can brag 'bout having a pixelexia, right?"

Rapangel was on brink of tears again, but tears of joy this time. She gave all two of them a tight hug, knowing that no one else can certainly brag about having such wonderful friends as them, and happily accepted all of the gifts, slightly glitching.

"I... I don't know what to say, it's... it's so nice of you... You didn't have to do it..."

"But we did, and the main thing is you're happy, so we're happy too, right, Sticky?" - Hic replied, and Mer nodded in agreement. - "Oh, we've found a new friend in these woods. Rapangel, meet E. Aster Bunnymund, otherwise known as Easter Bunny."

Both shook each other's hands.

"Wow, he's so... big and cool." - Punzie said, astonished. - "I always pictured him as a more... well, "cute and cuddly" sorta rabbit."

Bunny's reaction? One word - facepalm.

"Neveh say tha' about him next time, 'kay?" - the red head whispered into blondie's ear. - "He _really_ doesn't like it."

She responded in a quick nod. Then the girl turned to her friends.

"Thanks again for you surprise, it's... really lovely. So lovely I forgot why I came here in the first place..." - Angel humbly lowered her eyes, but in just a moment they became sparkled. - "Oh, now I remember! Jack and I found such a cool place! It's inside a mountain, what was its name... Ah! Diet Cola Mountain! You totally have to check it out! Come on! And don't forget to tell me about your adventures in the forest!"

"Okay, but if you promise to tell us about yours!" - the boy cried as the three walked to their karts. Mer turned around to see if Bunnymund wanted to come along, but he stayed in place.

"Aren't yeh comin'?"

"I'll go on my own. I know all the shortcuts around here."

MeriDough shrugged and rejoined her friends. Let the rabbit do his thing. As the three approached the cars, Toothlice, who was also very pleased to see Rapangel again, wanted to climb off the kart to give her a greeting lick, but as soon as he leaned on his right front paw, he winced and decided to stay where he was. Blondie's eyes immediately filled with worry.

"What happened to Toothlice?"

"Crash landing." - Hiccup answered. - "Tough one, I have to say. Bunny said he was gonna be limping until the next day for sure."

Punzie stroke the poor dragon's nose, which resulted in him sneezing one time. She giggled at that and slightly scratched him under his chin, then hopped into her kart, just like MeriDough and Hiccup.

"Okay, so as I promised, I go first." - she said, starting her cupcake vehicle. - "It all started when I drove away from the starting line of the speedway..."

Bunnymund watched kids moving further and further away, until they were more like tiny dots at the horizon. Smiling, he darted towards the Coke bottle-shaped mountain, using all his four paws. After all, he _did_ know all the shortcuts of this game, it was printed in his code.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two Guardians found, one to go! Toothiana's turn will be after the next chapter. Speaking of that, write which one of the guardians and Sugar Rush racers from the movies you like most and why (Jack and Vanellope don't count ^^). And don't forget to comment on my fanfic in general, appreciation is always welcome!
> 
> HTTYD and ROTG belong to Dreamworks  
> Tangled and WIR belong to Disney  
> Brave belongs to Disney/Pixar


	9. The Secret Hangout and a Mysterious Legend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 8, in which our heroes create a hangout inside the Diet Cola Mountain

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I'm back and full of energy!  
> Good news: school year is finally over!  
> Bad news: exams ahead! And my parents keep telling me: read, read, read, prepare for your history exam! But I spend most of my time writing, solving online history tests and watching Big Four pics on DA.

The huge bottle-shaped mountain, known as Diet Cola Mountain, grew bigger and bigger as our trio approached it in their karts. Just as all three of them promised, they retold their amazing and somewhat funny adventures. Hiccup once again mocked Taffyta, her "Stay Sweet!" in particular, making the girls, and himself, burst into laughing. Soon Hiccup, Rapangel and MeriDough reached the area glazed by Jack some time ago.

"Wow, tha's a lotta frostin'!" - Mer gasped in shock. - "Did Jack make all o' tha'?"

Punzie nodded, smiling. That sure was impressive enough for "forest adventurers" to see half of the valley faintly glittering under the sun, even Toothlice let out a low growl of astonishment. After they drove round the glaze, the racers stopped at the small arch made of two lollipops, surrounded from both sides with middle-sized gumdrops. To their ultimate surprise, Bunny was standing there, leaning to the sturdy Coke-brown surface of the mountain covered with pink and purple lollipops sticking vertically out of its base, and checking one of his boomerangs.

"Wow, you got here pretty fast, kiddos!" - he spoke with his usual Australian accent. - "I only stopped here 15 minutes ago and waited for you all this time."

All three looked deadpanned. 15 minutes ago? How?

"Sweet niblets!" - blondie exclaimed. - "How did you get here so fast?"

"She's right." - Mer agreed with her. - "Last time I saw yeh standin' at the edge o' th' woods!"

"I told you: I know _all_ the shortcuts."

The racers exchanged expressive glances, then Hiccup finally broke the silence:

"Wow! It must be hard to remember so many roads in _this_ place!" - he said brightly, looking around the scenery. - 'I certainly wouldn't.' - after that the boy turned to blondie. - "So, is this the place you wanted to show us?"

"Yep. The Diet Cola Mountain." - Rapangel smiled, got out of her kart and came closer to an area under the lollipop arch, somewhere near Bunny, pointing her hand at the wall on her right. - "It's right here."

"Umm, there's nothin' but wall, Punzie." - MeriDough looked at it rather skeptically, so did Hic.

"That's the trick, Mer! At first glance - nothing special. But if you try to go _inside_ …" - Angel put her hand onto the mountain's surface and… it _did_ go through like a hot knife through butter! - "Ta-da! It's a secret passageway! Now c'mon, Jack, Pascal and Mr. Sandman are waiting for us!"

Sticky excitedly hopped out of her vehicle and followed Punzie. Hiccup also got out of his car and helped Toothlice clime down onto the ground.

"Feeling better, buddy?" - he asked his licorice friend, and the reptile nodded in agreement. The dragon tried to step and, luckily, his paws were now alright, but he still limped on his right one - probably, it was hurt really badly during the crash landing. Anyway, the chocolate egg Bunnymund gave him sure did the trick. The two walked through the secret opening under the arch, Bunny following behind.

They appeared in some sort of a cave, with stalagmites and stalactites - everything, in fact - made of a solid coke soil with little white dots. It wasn't very high, but it was nonetheless quite wide, wide enough to actually move around in a kart. The cave corridor led them to a big opening, in the middle of which was a lava lake. Wait, it's not lava! It's boiling coke! Above it were weird tall stalagmites made of some sort of white round pills growing from the ceiling. On the left and on the right of the boiling pit were four sheds, two on each side. They were quite simply built: salted Pocky sticks framings, waffle roofs and round gelatine beds, on one of which was Jack's candy cane crook. Above the lake, on the alike framings, but much sturdier, was some sort of a track with a huge hole in the middle, which made it look like a jump.

Hiccup and Toothlice looked around in awe. A cave inside the mountain and no one but him and his friends knows about it! It's downright cool! Speaking of friends, MeriDough and Rapangel, with completely awoken Pascal on her shoulders again, were briefly retelling Jack and Sandy the adventures of our Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream and Cinnamon Roll racers in the Candy Cane Forest. Quite soon their company was joined by Bunny.

"Sandy! Long time no see, mate! How are you doing?" - he warmly greeted the little cone sugar man, who responded in smiling back and waving his hand. The two shook each other's hands.

"You know each other?" - Jack asked them, surprised.

"Of course! My old friend, Sandman, or I shoulda say, Sugary Sandman. He cares about the racers and makes sure they have good dreams." - Bunnymund answered, friendly patting Sandy on the back. - "A well slept racer is an active racer. And people love active racers."

Blondie and the white-haired boy shared confused glances. "Sugary Sandman" was his name all along?

"Well, at least we guessed it right." - the boy simply shrugged his shoulders. Meanwhile, Hiccup was checking out the sigh standing near the coke lake.

"Diet Cola hot springs." - he read aloud. - "Watch out for... falling Mentos?"

"Yeah, check it out! Look!" - the Peppermint Hot Chocolate racer picked up a pebble from the ground and tossed it into one of the Mentos stalactites, resulting in one of its pieces falling into the boiling coke. In just a second there was a fizzy eruption! Toothlice, startled by the explosion, quickly hid behind the closest stalagmite, wincing from pain in the paw and slightly shaking from fear and shock. In the meantime, Hic almost burned his feet from the splash of the boiling-hot liquid.

"Oh, you gotta watch out for the splashes. That stuff is _broiling_ hot!" - Jack warned his friend.

"Yeah, got it. Thank you." - the boy answered somewhat sarcastically.

"An' wha's with this dump?" - MeriDough asked, showing at the road above her.

"I don't know." - Angel shrugged her shoulders. - "Some sort of an… unfinished bonus level. Pretty cool, huh? Sandy… umm…" - she turned to Sandman. - "Is it okay if I call you Sandy?" - blondie asked. Cone sugar person replied in nodding with a smile. She thanked him and turned to Mer again. - "Sandy showed us this place. Wonderful, right? And nobody except for us knows about it, so we wanted…"

"Yeah, we wanted to know if you like our idea to…" - Jack interrupted her, but she didn't really mind it, though she did frown a bit at his not-so-good manners.

"Make this our secret hangout!" - the two exclaimed in unison once again, their arms raised. The racers bursted into laughing, with Jack remarking: "Hah, that's starting to become a habit."

"O' course I like it!" - Sticky smiled with her widest smile, clapping excitedly in a childish manner. That's understandable, because she is a kid after all. - "No, no, no, no, I LOVE it!"

"Completely agreeing with her. Great idea, guys!" - Hic smiled too, raising his thumb.

"I knew you'd say yes." - the white-head said. - "So while you, Punzie, were away, Sandy and I built those four shacks for us. They don't really look great, but you'll be able to decorate them in any way you like! Mine is over there!" - he pointed to the shack which was on the bottom left if you look from above and in the opposite direction from the secret entrance, the one where his "staff" was. Rapangel chose the one next to Jack's, Hiccup's was on upper right, MeriDough's next to Hic's.

"At least we now have a place to sleep at night." - Angel smiled, sitting on her bed and swinging her feet funnily. - "Hey, what about a game?"

"If it's a story-tellin' game, I'm in!" - Sticky stood upright, eager to start.

"And I just so happen to know one." - Bunny suddenly spoke up. - "Wanna listen?"

He didn't have to ask twice. The racers, even Sandy, came and sat around him, with curiosity shining in their big bright eyes. The rabbit chuckled and sat down too. The story time started.

"My story is a legend few game characters know. The legend of the most mysterious virus in the whole arcade - The Pitch Virus."

"Wow, there are other games as well?" - Jack just couldn't help but ask. Sandman nodded and pressed his finger on his lips, meaning "Don't interrupt Bunny again like that, okay?" The boy obediently nodded.

"Thanks, mate." - Bunny said. - "Yes, there are many other games outside this one, hope you happen to visit them sometime. But let's get back to the story. The Pitch Virus is so mysterious because very little is actually known about him. Legend goes that ten years ago a kid tried to hack the game called "Woody's Roundup" to get the highest score on the board, but caused it glitch and malfunction. It was put out of order for good, but not before Pitch Virus came to life and hid in the shadows of the Game Central Station."

Hiccup was about to ask Bunnymund about the Game Central Station and what does "put out of order" mean, but quickly changed his mind.

"It is said that when it's active, it makes a high-pitched sound, hence his name. This virus is considered extremely dangerous because even though it cannot destroy a game by itself, it's able to easily corrupt data, so, through a game character, it can become powerful enough to take the arcade under its control."

Punzie humbly raised her hand.

"What is it, sweetheart?" - the rabbit gently asked her.

"What's a virus?" - she asked him.

"Good question, kiddo. It's the most horrible thing in the arcade world. They are able to wreck game's codes, and without anyone to stop them, they'll _take over_ the whole data! But do you think it'll end there?"

"Yes!" - Mer cried bravely, but was quickly interrupted by Bunny, who stared right into her eyes.

"WRONG! Remember, kids, viruses **do not stop**!" - his voice clearly showed his hatred toward those always hungry bags of twisted code. He even poked the redhead in the stomach at the last three emphasized words. - "Once they finish off one game, they'll invade another until the whole arcade is _nothin'_ but an abandoned hollow of deranged illusions. So you'd better hope that you will never run into one in your life."

That was one undoubtedly impressive speech, for our four heroes nodded, slightly scared, their eyes wide; Rapangel even gulped nervously. Maybe it was overly impressive because a second after Bunnymund finished his words another Mentos fell from the stalactite into the boiling coke, causing another eruption, making the racers jump in places from shock and unexpectedness. Sandy frowned at his old friend, speechlessly saying: "Great way of entertaining kids, friend." And ironically, of course. Meanwhile, Jack quickly understood it was time to lighten up the atmosphere a little.

"Guys, I suggest throwing a party! C'mon, we've got our own hangout, karts, we're official racers of the game! It's a fair reason to celebrate!" - then he turned to Sandy and pointed at him with his both hands. - "Maestro, music!"

Cone sugar man immediately brightened up, smiled, made a sugary guitar and started playing a lively melody as The Peppermint Hot Chocolate racer took his crook from his bed and gifted it to Rapangel.

"Your microphone, angel." - he said with a sweet smile. She accepted it, smiling too, and added some beautiful singing voice into the music:

" _Switch on the sky and the stars glow for you  
Go see the world 'cause it's all so brand new  
Don't close your eyes 'cause your future's ready to shine  
It's just a matter of time, before we learn how to fly  
Welcome to the rhythm of the night  
There's something in the air you can't deny  
It's been fun but now I've got to go   
Life is way too short to take it slow_

_But before I go and hit the road  
I gotta know, 'til then,   
when can we do this again?_

_Oh oh oh oh  
When can I see you again?   
Oh oh oh oh   
When can we do this again?_

_Oh oh oh oh  
I gotta know, when can I see you again?_"

Everyone was dancing and having fun: MeriDough was twirling around between jumping Jack and Hiccup, Sandy added some cone sugar animals running around the Diet Cola hot springs, Toothlice moved his head in the rhythm of the tune, and Pascal kept changing flavors: from strawberry to orange, from orange to lemon, from lemon to apple, from apple to blueberry, from blueberry to grape, and from grape back to strawberry; even Bunny joined the party.

" _When can I see you again?  
Tell me when   
When can I see you again?_"

Finally, the song ended. Our four heroes stopped dancing, but they still smiled and laughed.

"Now that… That was fun!" - the white-haired boy said, slightly panting.

"The coolest party ever!" - Punzie exclaimed, handling the candy cane crook back to its owner.

"Ha, wait 'ntil I win The Random Roster Race, then it'll be th' coolest party evah!" - Sticky put her hands on her waist.

And that's when all of the racers felt like they were hit with a brick.

"THE RANDOM ROSTER RACE!!!" - they shouted in unison.

"Salted Christmas cookies, how could we forget about it?" - Jack clapped his forehead.

"We still have some time! Hurry up, or we're gonna be late for sure!" - Hiccup told his friends, and they, along with Toothlice and Pascal, ran towards their karts. The racers quickly jumped into them and started the engines. But one little question suddenly struck Angel.

"Umm… Anyone knows where the speedway is?"

Everyone looked at each other, deadpanned. None of them knew the way back! Fortunately, Bunny and Sandy were there to help them. The sandman blowed some sugar on the road, and a little sugary creature appeared in front of our heroes. And then another one. And another! All of them were two times smaller than Sandy, gesturing towards themselves, quietly whispering like little children when telling horror stories in a dark room with lit flashlights under their faces, and formed some sort of a trail.

"Those are will-o'-the-wisps, kids. They'll lead ya to the main track by the shortcut. You'll be at the speedway in no time!" - Bunnymund said to the four.

"Thank you, Mr. Bunny!" - Punzie politely replied. In a matter of seconds our big four with their pets rushed along the road shown by the wisps, riding to get back in time for the first real race in their lives.

"Awesome racers, aren't they?" - with his arms crossed on his chest, Bunny addressed Sandy as Hiccup, MeriDough, Rapangel and Jack became nothing but tiny dots moving in the horizon. - "Still got a lot to learn, but they'll adapt in pretty well, and the players will love them. What do you think, mate?"

Sandman warmly smiled. Then he brightly clicked his fingers and an image of two clashing swords with a top hat appeared above his head.

"What? You think _they'll_ be able to fight against the king?"

The cone sugar man nodded, his face straitened with seriousness.

"Hmm… I'm not sure about this, Sandy, though you've rarely ever been wrong. Looks like everything we can do right now is watch and wait."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song Rapangel sings here is "When Can I See You Again?" by Owl City from Wreck-It Ralph
> 
> HTTYD and ROTG belong to Dreamworks  
> Tangled WIR belongs to Disney  
> Brave belongs to Disney/Pixar


	10. Let The Random Roster Race Commence! part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Part 1 of chapter 9, in which our heroes arrive on their first official race

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YYYYYEEEESSSSS, I'm back from the dead! No more exams! Yay! Still, there's my part-time job, but who cares! FREEDOM!!!  
> Glad to be back and finally bring you a new fresh chapter! And... meet Toothiana! BTW, what's the name of the guy that waves a checkered flag on the races, cuz I have no idea.

The kids moved up the speedway as fast as their karts allowed them to. Wind rushed by in their ears. Toothlice, with Pascal on his head, barely kept up with his friends, mostly because of his still aching front right paw, although he ran on his highest speed, bearing the pain. MeriDough led the way for the other racers, who were not too far behind, following the directions shown by the cone sugar wisps. Their fast disappearing as soon as she drove very close to them, and the fact that they were quite hard to notice on the track due to the light colors of the road, made driving a bit problematic for the red-haired girl, but she kept her eyes peeled in order not to miss the next whispering creature. Driving seemed to last for hours, even though it's been only for 10 minutes.

"Are we there yet?" - Jack shouted from her back really loudly, but still because of roaring engines his words seemed to be muffled.

"No, but ah hope we're close." - Mer cried back.

All of them were totally nervous, since the racers were driving late to their first Random Roster race, which may start at any minute! And a clear example of the strong sense of worry in the air around was Rapangel. Poor thing, she's only recently discovered her glitching problem, and hasn't yet learned to keep it under control, so any strong emotion (since Punzie's a pretty emotional girl, her feeling are usually written all over her face) often results in her body breaking into tiny pinkish-purple rectangles of binary code. And that's what was happening right now. Even though her glitching lasts for only a split second, during driving it may become very dangerous. Angel tried to remain calm, fight her nervousness and stay focused on the road, but it was very hard for her to deal with overthrowing emotions.

Very soon the trail of sugar will-o'-the-wisps ended. But it wasn't much of a tragedy, for now in the distance the starting line was peacefully shining under the everlasting game sun.

"Th' starting line! We're here!" - Sticky alerted everyone as soon as she saw it. Everyone hoorayed loudly and in unison.

Meanwhile at the red and white checkered line a girl, part human part hummingbird, about 15-17 years old if judging by her appearance, flew around in worry. Her long blue feathers made of very thin and light licorice were ruffling from her concern. With her big purple eyes she checked every single one of her little fairy helpers and once again counted the racers. Four, i.e. our heroes, were still not in their places, which were shown by blinking crossed red rectangles as long as an average kart. The girl was looking around impatiently, waiting for them to show up.

'Where are they? The race is about to start!' - she thought, moving her glance from the horizon to her fairies who were cleaning the starting line, helping the racers prepare and checking the cameras so they could record everything and back to the horizon, hoping the four racers would appear as soon as possible.

Fortunately, hope wasn't lost. In the distance were little cars, promptly getting closer and closer. The hummingbird girl smiled wildly: those were our heroes! They're here! So not to wast time in waiting, she flew around and made sure everyone was ready for the race and wore their helmets. She always checked the racers for helmets so, if something happened, no one would hurt their heads.

After a few minutes, Hiccup, Jack, Rapangel and MeriDough took their places in the last line on the blinking rectangles, which disappeared as soon as they did so. Gloyd and Swizzle, who were sitting in their karts in front of them, and Snowanna Rainbeau, who was on Mer's left, greeted the four.

"Wow, we're back. It's a miracle. A miracle!" - Hic said with a little note of irony as his best reptile friend finally caught up with them, panting from running and slightly whining due to the aching paw. Pascal quickly jumped from Toothlice's head and ran toward his owner. Punzie smiled and placed her gummybear friend on her shoulder.

The overly excited girl welcomed them all with a huge smile on her face.

"Oh, sweet Diet Cola Mountain, it's a good thing you've arrived on time! I'd never forgive myself if you missed your first race!" - she spoke pretty fast, but anyway her speech was understandable. - "By the way, my name is Toothiana, and my little helpers and I take care of everything around here." - she shook her hand with our four heroes. - "Oh, I've got something for you, kids! Wait here, I'll be back before you know it!"

"Uh-huh. Like we're actually planning to go somewhere else." - Hiccup said sarcastically to Jack as Tooth flew to her small closet-like house. The white-haired boy nodded in reply. Just then he noticed one of Toothiana's mini-fairies happily flying around him. She stopped right in front of his face, waved to him and started hovering above his head. The Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream racer couldn't not notice that. - "Well, looks like you made a new friend."

"I'm back!" - the hummingbird girl cried as she approached our friends. In her hands were four racing helmets. - "I made these while you were away. Here, put them on. I don't want you to hurt yourselves during the race!"

And so she gave each of our heroes their own head gear. Jack got a red and white striped helmet, which design looked like a little candy in his hair. Hiccup's one was styled just like his cap: mint green with numerous brown dots resembling chocolate chip. Rapangel was given a helmet with a white spiral from bottom to top with sprinkles of various colors, making it similar to a cupcake frosting. MeriDough got a chocolate-brown one with a big orange splash of honey, covering the upper half of her head gear.

The Peppermint Hot Chocolate racer has already put on his helmet and chuckled at Hic, who was desperately trying to fit his head into his own one. He looked up at the shining gold "Start" arch and only now did he notice a very tall popcorn tribune on its right, two times taller than any other one. Somehow he didn't see it before.

"Umm... Excuse me, ma'am..." - Jack humbly raised his hand, addressing Toothiana. She quickly flew to him.

"Yes, my dear, what is it?"

"Whom does that stand over there belong to?" - he pointed at it.

"Oh, that... It's the king's tribune." - her mood went blue all of a sudden. - "Usually he would sit there and watch all of the races here, cheering for a different contestant every time. Mostly his little sister Vanellope, of course, because she's his sister as you already know and he himself taught her how to drive. He loved to see her with the winner's cup in her hands..." - she chuckled sadly and sighed. - "Alas, now he spends his time in a castle and doesn't show up here anymore."

"The king?" - Hiccup asked her after finally putting on his helmet properly. - "You mean... what was his name?.. ...king Greed-pop, right?"

"Yes." - Tooth answered. - "King Greed-pop von Schweetz." - shortly after she flew back to her closet, probably to take something.

Yep. Royalty indeed, it's seen even in his last name. 

Carefully, so not to get stuck in the helmet completely, Hic checked the work of all the pedals, and as soon as he raised his head he saw eagerly looking Toothlice in front of him.

"No, buddy, you can't go with me." - he told his licorice dragon. Unfortunately, it caused no effect. He sighed, climbed out of his kart and came closer to his friend. - "Please, listen to me. You must stay here."

Toothlice waved his head towards Rapangel, then moved behind "Licorice Lightning".

"What do you mean?" - the brown-haired boy looked puzzled at first, but quickly got the point. - "Aaahh! Toothlice, you can't race along with the others - you're not even a contestant! And also your paw is still hurt, and you're not able to fly. It all will only slow you down."

The dragon pridefully raised his nose, meaning "I don't care!", but then he accidentally leaned onto his aching limb, causing the poor thing to wince. 

"See? That's what I mean, bud!" - Hic gently patted his friend on the head and looked into his big green eyes. - "Besides, there's a high risk somebody may crush into you or run over. And I'll never forgive myself if something horrible happens to you. I can't let you go with me."

"I'm afraid he's right, sweetie." - Toothiana suddenly spoke up. She's already returned from her closet and was holding a red and white checkered flag in her hands. - "No animals are allowed on the track, no matter big or small."

Angel looked anxious. "Not even Pascal?"

"Not even him, darling." - the hummingbird girl said gently, carefully picking up the chameleon from the blondie's shoulder. - "I'm really sorry, but the rules are rules; I didn't make them, and I can't change them."

Toothlice looked at Hiccup with his sorrowful emerald eyes.

"It's okay, buddy. I'll be fine, I promise." - the boy said soothingly to him, stroke his head, and then received a wet lick in the face. - "Everything's gonna be alright. Now, be a good dragon and _stay here_."

The licorice reptile obediently went to the tribunes and sat in front of them. Tooth flew to him and placed Pascal nearby.

"Don't worry about me, Toothlice. I'll be fine." - Hic said to him while climbing back into his cart with a sweet smile.

It's pretty obvious that this whole scene was being watched by all the other racers, and they all achieved some respect towards the Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream racer and his care about the reptile.

"Isn't he just adorable, Cherry?" - Candlehead asked Jubileena. The candle-loving girl has already developed a small crush on the brown-haired boy.

"Yeah, he's cute." - she answered, smiling. - "For a dragon."

Candlehead only snorted, frowned and watched Toothiana fly to the starting line and stop in front of Taffyta.

"Okay, all racers are here, which is good." - she started her speech she says probably at every race. - "So, I bet our new kids know the rules, like everyone else, and I don't have to repeat them all over again, but I will any way because I want to. And here they are!.."

"Psst. Psst! Gloyd!" - Jack called his friend until he turned to the boy. - "Does she often do it?"

"Do what?"

"Well... repeat the rules."

"Aah! Nope, that's quite rare of her."

"Thanks." - Jack looked up at the hummingbird girl, who's already finished retelling the main rules of the Random Roster Race.

"...and these are all of the main rules. And now, some side ones. No biting, no scratching, no kicking, no burping, no slurping, no _cursing_ ," - she emphasized this word, narrowing her eyes at Taffy, - "no squalling, no wrestling, no "he" and no "hi!", and, more that anything, no cheating!"

"No cheating? Hey, that's not fair!" - Gloyd cried, though everyone knew he was just kidding.

"That's it, kids. Good luck, play fair and be careful on the road!"

"Buckle up, rookies." - Swizzle looked at our four heroes and smirked. - "The race starts _now_!"

"And now... Let the Random Roster Race commence!" - Toothiana shouted aloud, waved her checkered flag and instantly raised high above the track so she wouldn't be ran over. All 15 karts rushed forward, their owners, surrounded by cheering citizens, determined to win. Behind them was one of the camera fairies, recording the race from the back view. The leader in our group of four became Jack, MeriDough behind him, Hiccup and Rapangel moving nose to nose. Soon everyone became small dots moving towards the first main road point - the Gumball Gorge. Toothiana landed near Toothlice, gently patted his head and looked at one of the Jumbotrons, where were listed names of the racers. Her job for now was done. It's up to them to drive their way to victory.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, I'm starting to like Candlehead's small crush on Hiccup, but I don't pair them, no.  
> Trivia: can you find a "Gnomeo and Juliet" quote in here?  
> HTTYD and ROTG belong to Dreamworks  
> Tangled and WIR belong to Disney  
> Brave belongs to Disney/Pixar

**Author's Note:**

> I may continue if you like but I'm not sure, 'cause I'm lazy by nature + school + don't have my PC + writing on an Android is a total bulls**t.
> 
> Sugar Rush belongs to Disney  
> Lorax characters belong to Universal Pictures and Illumination Entertainment


End file.
